Does the Plaintiff Matter?: An Empirical Analysis of Lead Plaintiffs in Securities Class Actions

With the enactment of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PSLR) the U.S. Congress introduced sweeping substantive and procedural reforms for securities class actions. A central provision of the Act is the lead plaintiff provision, which creates a rebuttable presumption that the investor with the largest financial interest in a securities fraud class action should be appointed the lead plaintiff for the suit. The lead plaintiff provision was adopted to encourage a class member with a large financial stake to become the class representative. Congress expected that such a plaintiff would actively monitor the conduct of a securities fraud class action so as to reduce the litigation agency costs that may arise when class counsel\u27s interests diverge from those of the shareholder class. Now, more than ten years after the enactment of the lead plaintiff provision, the claim that the lead plaintiff, and particularly the lead plaintiff that is an institutional investor, is a more effective monitor of class counsel in securities fraud class actions continues to be intuitively appealing, but remains unproven. In this study, Professors Cox and Thomas inquire anecdotally and empirically whether the lead plaintiff provision has performed as projected. The anecdotal evidence they uncover is mixed: in some instances demonstrating the virtues of the lead plaintiff provision, while in others showing that the provision has encountered difficulties, including hesitance among institutional lead plaintiffs to take on the burden of serving as lead plaintiff (though recently more institutional investors are taking on the role of lead plaintiff) and allegations of pay-to-play schemes between plaintiffs\u27 law firms and potential lead plaintiffs. Professors Cox and Thomas then conduct a series of statistical analyses of the lead plaintiff provision\u27s costs and benefits. Surprisingly, their results indicate that the ratio of settlement amounts to estimated provable losses in securities class actions---the most important indicator of whether investors have been compensated for their damages---has been lower since the passage of the PSLRA and that settlement size has not increased since the passage of PSLRA. However, they also find that the presence of an institutional investor increases the dollar amount of settlements in those cases in which they appear, suggesting that the current trend for institutional investors to be lead plaintiffs in securities class actions will positively affect average settlement size in such actions in the future. Their analysis also sheds new light on the relative impacts other types of lead plaintiffs, such as individuals versus an aggregation of individuals, have on the outcome of settlements. They conclude with a discussion of the policy implications of their findings

SEC Enforcement Heuristics: An Empirical Inquiry

This Article examines the overlap between SEC securities enforcement actions and private securities fraud class actions. We begin with an overview of data concerning all SEC enforcement actions from 1997 to 2002. We find that the volume of SEC enforcement proceedings is relatively modest. We next examine the scope of the recently enacted Fair Fund provision that authorizes the SEC to designate civil penalties it recovers from defendants to benefit defrauded private investors. We conclude that this provision offers only limited potential relief for private investors. We complete this Part of the Article with an analysis of the serious resource limitations faced by the SEC. The second portion of the Article contains an empirical analysis of the determinants of SEC enforcement actions and the overlap of private fraud suits and SEC enforcement proceedings. Using bivariate analysis, we find that (1) private suits with parallel SEC actions settle for significantly more than private suits without such proceedings; (2) SEC enforcement actions target significantly smaller companies than private actions alone; (3) private cases with parallel SEC actions take substantially less time to settle than other private cases; and (4) private cases with parallel SEC actions have significantly longer class periods than other private actions. Finally, we create a model for estimating damages to compare settlement ratios in cases with parallel SEC actions to those in private actions. We find that one-fourth of all the private class action settlements occurring in suits that yield less than 10 percent of provable losses are settled for less than 2 percent of provable losses, but that there are no private actions with parallel SEC suits with such small settlements. In the final Part of the Article, we conduct a multivariate regression analysis of the determinants of when SEC enforcement actions are filed. We find that the most highly significant determinant of SEC actions is financial distress. Estimated losses do not appear to be a statistically significant factor in the SEC\u27s decision to file these suits

How Mothers Make Decisions for Feeding Young Children: A Grounded Theory Approach

In this study a theory of how mothers make decisions about feeding their young children aged 3 to 5 years was developed using the grounded theory technique. In-depth interviews were conducted with 50 married mothers of children aged 3 to 5 to determine their mealtime practices and feelings about mealtimes. Interviews were audio taped and transcribed verbatim. Transcribed interviews were analyzed using the grounded theory technique to build a theory from the data (interviews). Analyses of mothers’ interviews indicated that mothers in this study formed expectations for 5 distinct stages of feeding decisions based on their experiences. The five stages were food planning, food acquisition, timing of eating, food preparation, and food consumption. Mothers approached feeding decisions at any stage with preconceived notions about how the decision should be made. At the time of the decision, mothers made specific assessments within the context of that decision to form perceptions about what their child needed and what barriers existed to implementing their expectations for the situation. If the mothers’ perceptions were compatible with the expectations they held for that decision, mothers implemented their expectations. If their perceptions were not compatible with their expectations for the situation, mothers employed strategies to manage the differences between perceptions and expectations. The strategies they employed were maintaining expectations, modifying or abandoning expectations, compromising expectations, or planning to control the barriers to meeting their expectations. The following document describes the theory that was developed from this research. It is divided into parts as follows. Part 1 contains a review of literature regarding meal patterns and child-feeding practices. Parts 2-4 describe the theory that was developed using grounded theory analysis on the interviews with mothers. Part 2 describes the causal and contextual conditions in mothers’ child-feeding decisions. Part 3 describes the intervening condition of expectations that mothers formed from experience and brought with them into the feeding decisions they faced. Part 4 describes the overall theory and its development, focusing on the action/interaction strategies mothers used in child-feeding decisions. Finally, Part 5 provides a detailed description of the methodology used for this study

Toward an empathetic understanding of scholarship

In this paper I take an autobiographical stance on knowledge production in the field of Mathematics Education, acknowledging forms of academic and racial privilege. I use my experiences as a backdrop by which to project a more empathetic approach to scholarship in mathematics education. Using the framework of rough draft thinking (JANSEN et al., 2015), I expose the contradictions in what we believe to be true about the acquisition and generation of mathematical and pedagogical knowledge, and the structures of scholarship in mathematics education. I make three recommendations: 1. address the need for rough draft spaces within the existing structure of academia; 2. we should reimagine our roles within the peer-review system; and 3. we need to adopt more empathetic methodologies that allow human voices to be centered in our scholarship without reduction or interpretation. It is no longer acceptable to believe that the gaze and interpretation of an objective researcher is as valid as the first-hand perspective of participants

Preservice Elementary Teachers’ Beliefs about the Role of Definition in the Learning of Mathematics

Answering a call to emphasize the act of defining over the learning of definitions, we have shifted the content of a geometry course for preservice elementary teachers (PSETs) away from comparing and applying pre-written classification structures to classroom episodes centered on authoring definitions for special quadrilaterals. PSETs complete activities using geometry software, and collaboratively create definitions for specific quadrilaterals. In order to fully understand the potential of this curricular shift, we asked preservice elementary mathematics teachers’ to share their perceptions of the process of writing mathematical definitions. Data from participant reflections were analyzed for themes related to mathematical definition and the act of defining. The framework that resulted from iterative discussions by the researchers examined beliefs about the nature of definition and mathematical empathy (Araki, 2015). Findings also suggest that beliefs about authority and positioning students as authors of mathematics are associated with mathematical empathy. Experiences related to the process of defining enabled PSETs to see far greater subjectivity in the discipline of mathematics and to consider, perhaps for the first time, that they, too, were both able and deserving of becoming authors of mathematical ideas

Mathematics Teacher Educators\u27 Exploring Self-Based Methodologies

Historically underused methodologies in mathematics teacher education such as narrative inquiry, self-study, and autoethnography (i.e., self-based methodologies) are becoming a more frequent choice of mathematics teacher educators (MTEs). This has opened new challenges for MTEs as they try to disseminate their findings in mathematics education journals. Building from our working group at PME-NA 2018, we respond to the need for creating spaces (communities) where MTEs can feel supported in their study design, implementation, representation of findings, and publication using self-based methodologies. This year, we shift our focus from discussion to mentoring and scholarship on self-based methodologies. We invite MTEs with research projects in any stage of preparation to join us to in discussions meant to promote growth, sustainability, and continued insight into the use of self-based methodologies

Effect of Age at Menarche on Anterior Cruciate Ligament Injury Incidence and Anterior Knee Laxity in Collegiate Athletes

Female athletes suffer painful, costly, and career-limiting non-contact anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries more often than males. Previous research suggests that pubertal neuromusculoskeletal development contributes to this sex-bias, but the manner in which variation in pubertal development affects injury risk within females is poorly understood. Age at menarche is a variable, significant pubertal developmental event, signaling the onset of estrogen cycling and affecting musculoskeletal development. Earlier menarche may increase injury risk, possibly by increasing anterior knee laxity through prolonged estrogen exposure. The purpose of this case-control study was to test the primary hypothesis that collegiate athletes with previous ACL injuries have earlier age at menarche than their uninjured peers, and to test the secondary hypothesis that earlier menarche is related to greater anterior knee laxity in injured and uninjured athletes. The study sample consisted of female NCAA Division-I varsity athletes (N=14 injured, N=120 uninjured). Outcome measures included: menstrual history and ACL injury details (injury age, activity at time of injury, contact vs. non-contact), assessed by questionnaire; and anterior knee laxity assessed by KT-1000 arthrometer. Correlation, t-tests, and regression analysis were used to test for associations between age at menarche, injury incidence, and knee laxity. Fourteen athletes reported ≥1 non-contact ACL injury, and had significantly earlier menarche than uninjured athletes (12.6±1.3 y vs. 13.4±1.4 y; P=0.05). Earlier menarche also significantly predicted injury status (Wald c2=7.43; Pb=-1.02±0.37; OR=0.36; 95% CI:0.17-0.75), but was not correlated with anterior knee laxity. Within injured athletes, however, laxity in the unaffected knee was significantly related to time since menarche (r2=0.79, Pr2=0.72,