Citrus trade liberalization with Japan

trade liberalization, Japan, citrus, Agribusiness, International Relations/Trade,

Does comorbid anxiety counteract emotion recognition deficits in conduct disorder?

Background: Previous research has reported altered emotion recognition in both conduct disorder (CD) and anxiety disorders (ADs) - but these effects appear to be of different kinds. Adolescents with CD often show a generalised pattern of deficits, while those with ADs show hypersensitivity to specific negative emotions. Although these conditions often cooccur, little is known regarding emotion recognition performance in comorbid CD+ADs. Here, we test the hypothesis that in the comorbid case, anxiety-related emotion hypersensitivity counteracts the emotion recognition deficits typically observed in CD. Method: We compared facial emotion recognition across four groups of adolescents aged 12-18 years: those with CD alone (n = 28), ADs alone (n = 23), cooccurring CD+ADs (n = 20) and typically developing controls (n = 28). The emotion recognition task we used systematically manipulated the emotional intensity of facial expressions as well as fixation location (eye, nose or mouth region). Results: Conduct disorder was associated with a generalised impairment in emotion recognition; however, this may have been modulated by group differences in IQ. AD was associated with increased sensitivity to low-intensity happiness, disgust and sadness. In general, the comorbid CD+ADs group performed similarly to typically developing controls. Conclusions: Although CD alone was associated with emotion recognition impairments, ADs and comorbid CD+ADs were associated with normal or enhanced emotion recognition performance. The presence of comorbid ADs appeared to counteract the effects of CD, suggesting a potentially protective role, although future research should examine the contribution of IQ and gender to these effects

An Investigation Of The Determinants Of BTs Debt Levels From 1998-2002: What Does It Tell Us About The Optimal Capital Structure?

Over the period 1998-2001, British Telecom (BT) dramatically increased its debt levels, from 4.8bn in 1998 to 31bn in 2001. This was accompanied by a dramatic decrease in the firms share price. Subsequent pressure from analysts and investors induced BT to use a rights issue to substantially reduce debt in 2002 (from 31bn to 18.4bn). However, the share price has continued to fall, but not so dramatically. Hence, BT provides an ideal case study of the effects of capital structure on firm value. In this case study, we will consider such questions as:a) Why did BT take on so much debt? Why did it cause firm value to fall, when many capital structure theories suggest a positive relationship between leverage and firm value?b) Why has the reduction in debt not caused an increase in equity value?c) Was BT beyond its optimal debt/equity ratio from 1998-2001? Is it still beyond the optimum?d) Does BT have an optimal capital structure? What is it? Is it static? What are the trade-offs involved?e)Does BTs case hold lessons for other firms

A Theory of Entrepreneurial Overconfidence, Effort, and Firm Outcomes

We present a theory of entrepreneurial behavior that explores the relationship between overconfidence and successful firm outcomes, such as acquisition or IPO. In our model, increasing overconfidence produces two conflicting effects on the probability of a successful outcome: it not only induces an entrepreneur to increase the riskiness of a venture (which lowers the likelihood of successful exit), but also drives higher entrepreneurial effort, increasing likelihood of a successful exit. Due to this conflict, a kinked or U-shaped relationship may exist between overconfidence and positive outcomes. Furthermore, our model suggests that increased outside equity mitigates the effects of overconfidence

The Politics of Crime and Criminal Justice

This volume is about politics, crime, and criminal justice in the United States. As such, it reports on some of the fruits of an increasing amount of research that has been devoted to this topic in recent years. With the exception of one analytical essay on crime as an issue in American politics, all of the articles in the volume are based on original field research

Engineering study to determine feasible methods of simulating planetary albedo and radiation effects upon the thermal balance of spacecraft Final report

Planetary radiation and albedo effects on thermal balance of spacecraft orbiting Mars and Venu

Estimating Causal Effects in Linear Regression Models With Observational Data: The Instrumental Variables Regression Model

Instrumental variable methods are an underutilized tool to enhance causal inference in psychology. By way of incorporating predictors of the predictors (called "instruments" in the econometrics literature) into the model, instrumental variable regression (IVR) is able to draw causal inferences of a predictor on an outcome. We show that by regressing the outcome y on the predictors x and the predictors on the instruments, and modeling correlated disturbance terms between the predictor and outcome, causal inferences can be drawn on y on x if the IVR model cannot be rejected in a structural equation framework. We provide a tutorial on how to apply this model using ML estimation as implemented in structural equation modeling (SEM) software. We additionally provide code to identify instruments given a theoretical model, to select the best subset of instruments when more than necessary are available, and we guide researchers on how to apply this model using SEM. Finally, we demonstrate how the IVR model can be estimated using a number of estimators developed in econometric