Why Do Women Have Longer Unemployment Durations than Men in Post-Restructuring Urban China?

This paper provides the first systematic analysis of the reasons why women endure longer unemployment durations than men in post-restructuring urban China using data obtained from a national representative household survey. Rejecting the view that women are less earnest than men in their desire for employment, the analysis shows that women's job search efforts are handicapped by lack of access to social networks, social stereotyping (that married women are unreliable employees), unequal access to social reemployment services stemming from sex segregation prior to the displacement, and wage discrimination in the post-restructuring labor market.Gender inequality, unemployment duration, Oaxaca-decomposition

CagA-positive Helicobacter pylori may promote and aggravate scrub typhus

Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection may alter the host’s resistance to tsutsugamushi disease pathogens through the Th1 immune response, leading to potential synergistic pathogenic effects. A total of 117 scrub typhus cases at Beihai People’s Hospital and affiliated hospitals of Youjiang University for Nationalities and Medical Sciences were studied from January to December 2022, alongside 130 healthy individuals forming the control group. All participants underwent serum H. pylori antibody testing. The prevalence of H. pylori infection was significantly higher among scrub typhus patients (89.7%) compared to healthy individuals (54.6%) (p < 0.05). Moreover, type I H. pylori infection was notably more prevalent in scrub typhus cases (67.5%) compared to healthy individuals (30%) (p < 0.05). Multifactorial analysis demonstrated type I H. pylori infection as an independent risk factor for scrub typhus (adjusted odds ratio: 2.407, 95% confidence interval: 1.249–4.64, p = 0.009). Among scrub typhus patients with multiple organ damage, the prevalence of type I H. pylori infection was significantly higher (50.6%) than type II H. pylori infection (15.4%) (χ2 = 4.735, p = 0.030). These results highlight a higher incidence of H. pylori infection in scrub typhus patients compared to the healthy population. Additionally, type I H. pylori strain emerged as an independent risk factor for scrub typhus development. Moreover, individuals infected with type I H. pylori are more susceptible to multiple organ damage. These findings suggest a potential role of H. pylori carrying the CagA gene in promoting and exacerbating scrub typhus

Does “sheep” bring the bad luck? The impacts of education resources on education attainment and earnings in China

We establish that the birth year in China is related to educational attainment because of the superstitious believes that the girls who were born in the “sheep” year will suffer bad luck, and the education system. The crude birth rate declined in the “sheep” year and schools response to the fluctuations by class size in the short run because there were no binding constraints on the class size in China. We estimate the return to education by using birth year as an instrument for schooling

Does “sheep” bring the bad luck? The impacts of education resources on education attainment and earnings in China

We establish that the birth year in China is related to educational attainment because of the superstitious believes that the girls who were born in the “sheep” year will suffer bad luck, and the education system. The crude birth rate declined in the “sheep” year and schools response to the fluctuations by class size in the short run because there were no binding constraints on the class size in China. We estimate the return to education by using birth year as an instrument for schooling

COVID-19 information seeking and individuals’ protective behaviors: examining the role of information sources and information content

Abstract Background Seeking COVID-19 information promotes individuals to adopt preventive behaviors, including wearing a mask, social distancing, staying away from risky places, and washing hands. This study aims to investigate which information and sources individuals relied on in seeking COVID-19 information and further examine their roles in individuals’ adoption of preventive behaviors. Methods Through a statistical analysis of 1027 valid responses from citizens in different Chinese cities in 2022 to the self-designed items in an online survey, this study identified individuals’ preferred information sources and content on COVID-19. Regarding the information sources and content, the study used multiple regression analysis to examine their associations with individuals’ preventive behaviors, and further applied fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to explore their configurations that increase the likelihood of individuals adopting preventive behaviors. Results Individuals preferred information about the newest prevention and control policies, precautions and treatment, and symptoms from the sources of workplace and community, social media, and social live streaming services. Additionally, individuals’ preventive behaviors were positively related to the workplace and community (β = 0.202, p <.001), social live streaming services (β = 0.089, p <.01), government department websites (β = 0.079, p <.05), television (β = 0.073, p <.05), and online news media (β = 0.069, p <.05), but were negatively associated with newspapers (β=-0.087, p <.05). Regarding information content, precautions and treatments (β = 0.211, p <.001), the newest prevention and control policies (β = 0.173, p <.001), symptoms (β = 0.152, p <.001), and official rumor-dispelling information (β = 0.082, p <.05) had a positive relationship with individuals’ preventive behaviors. In addition, fsQCA results presented eight configurations that promote individuals to adopt preventive behaviors. The total coverage and solution consistency values were 0.869 and 0.987, respectively. Furthermore, COVID-19 information content, the sources of social media and interpersonal sources, and official news media played an essential role in increasing the likelihood of individuals adopting preventive behaviors. Conclusions Our findings demonstrated that individuals seek various COVID-19 information from multiple sources. The direct and degree of association of information sources and content with individuals’ preventive behaviors vary from source to source and from content to content. Information sources and content could combinatorially promote individuals to adopt preventive behaviors through several configurations

Cost-sensitive and hybrid-attribute measure multi-decision tree over imbalanced data sets

One of the most popular algorithms for classification is the decision tree. However, existing binary decision tree models do not handle well the minority class over imbalanced data sets. To address this difficulty, a Cost-sensitive and Hybrid attribute measure Multi-Decision Tree (CHMDT) approach is presented in this paper. It penalizes misclassification through a hybrid attribute measure, which is defined from the combination of the Gini index and information gain measure. It further builds a multi-decision tree consisting of multiple decision trees each with different root node information. The overall objective of the approach is to maximize the classification performance with the hybrid attribute measure while minimizing the total misclassification cost. Experiments are conducted over twelve KEEL imbalanced data sets to demonstrate the CHMDT approach. They show that the classification performance of the minority class is improved significantly without sacrifice of the overall classification accuracy of the majority class