Biotech Food Labeling and Consumer Response: An Analysis of the Effects of Voluntary rBGH-labels on the Market for Fluid Milk

Consumer/Household Economics,

US agricultural university students\u27 mental well-being and resilience during the first wave of COVID-19: Discordant expectations and experiences across genders

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic\u27s first wave led to declining mental health and life satisfaction outcomes for college students, especially women. While women in undergraduate agricultural programs outperformed men academically prior to and during the pandemic, the achievement may have come at personal cost, especially for those women with fewer personal and environmental resiliency resources. Our research objective was to expand on personal, social, and environmental factors linked with lower mental health and life satisfaction scores for students in agriculture during the pandemic. We measured the influence of such factors across gender-based mental health and life satisfaction outcomes. Our data were collected from 2030 students using an on-line survey across six land-grant university college of agriculture in agriculturally as many distinct regions of the United States. We estimated OLS and Ordered Probit models of their mental health and life satisfaction self-assessments. Our findings reveal students\u27 mental health and life satisfaction were reduced due to a paucity of personal (e.g., less future orientation or graduate school aspirations, food and housing insecurity, and personal health risks) and environmental (e.g., lower quality on-line learning experiences, isolation, family health risk, discrimination experiences) resiliency resources. Our results suggest women were more likely than men to be adversely affected by reduced resiliency resources. These findings suggest university emergency response policies need to address students\u27 needs for housing and food security, on-line course development and delivery, tele health and mental health resources, broad social inclusion and diversity to decrease risk of female attrition and support all students in agricultural degree programs

Search for heavy resonances decaying to two Higgs bosons in final states containing four b quarks

A search is presented for narrow heavy resonances X decaying into pairs of Higgs bosons (H) in proton-proton collisions collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC at root s = 8 TeV. The data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 19.7 fb(-1). The search considers HH resonances with masses between 1 and 3 TeV, having final states of two b quark pairs. Each Higgs boson is produced with large momentum, and the hadronization products of the pair of b quarks can usually be reconstructed as single large jets. The background from multijet and t (t) over bar events is significantly reduced by applying requirements related to the flavor of the jet, its mass, and its substructure. The signal would be identified as a peak on top of the dijet invariant mass spectrum of the remaining background events. No evidence is observed for such a signal. Upper limits obtained at 95 confidence level for the product of the production cross section and branching fraction sigma(gg -> X) B(X -> HH -> b (b) over barb (b) over bar) range from 10 to 1.5 fb for the mass of X from 1.15 to 2.0 TeV, significantly extending previous searches. For a warped extra dimension theory with amass scale Lambda(R) = 1 TeV, the data exclude radion scalar masses between 1.15 and 1.55 TeV

Measurement of the top quark mass using charged particles in pp collisions at root s=8 TeV

Peer reviewe

“A Definition at Last, But What Does it All Mean?” Newspaper Coverage of Organic Food Production and its Effects on Milk Purchases

This paper estimates the effects of media coverage of organic food production on food purchases. Information from several data sources links national and local newspaper coverage to fluid milk purchases. An analysis of weekly store-level scanner data in a differences-in-differences approach results in a 5% increase in organic milk sales relative to conventional milk sales. Increases in intensity of news coverage increase this relative difference in sales. Differentiating effects by media context further suggests that product category specific coverage increases sales more than general coverage. Critical coverage does not result in significant effects on organic milk sales

"A Definition at Last, but What Does It All Mean?"—Newspaper Coverage of the USDA Organic Seal and its Effects on Food Purchases-

This paper estimates the effects of media coverage in organic food production and the National Organic Program (NOP) on food purchases. Information from several independent data sources is complied into a unique data set that directly links national and local newspaper coverage to fluid milk consumption. An analysis of weekly store-level scanner data in a difference-in-differences approach suggests average increases in organic milk sales relative to conventional milk sales of 5 percent during weeks for which relevant news coverage is observed. Increases in intensity of news coverage, measured by the number of articles in a given week, are further found to increase the relative difference in sales but at a decreasing rate. However, these effects are found to dissipate quickly in the weeks following news coverage. Differentiating by context of observed articles suggests that product category specific coverage doubles observed increases in sales when compared to general coverage, while critical national and local coverage does not result in significant changes in organic milk sales. Furthermore, local news coverage seems to have a relatively higher impact than national news coverage, with increases in circulation of one local newspaper resulting in increased organic milk sales as well. Our results provide valuable insights for the evaluation of existing labeling regulations and future regulations on specialty foods in this context

"A Definition at Last, but What Does It All Mean?"—Newspaper Coverage of the USDA Organic Seal and its Effects on Food Purchases-

Replaced with revised version of paper 07/06/08.consumer demand, labeling, media effect, organic food, scanner data, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

Does Limited Access at School Result in Compensation at Home? The Effect of Soft Drink Bans in Schools on Purchase Patterns Outside of Schools

This paper investigates the effects of banning soft drinks in schools on purchases outside of school. We utilize unique household-level and store-level data sources in combination with time-series and cross-sectional variation of state-level regulations in a difference-in-differences (DD) approach. We detect a decrease in the overall trend in sales, but observe this downward trend in households with and without children, as well as in states with and without regulation. Controlling for advertising allows us to further reject that leading brands intensify their advertising efforts and target children to potentially offset their reduced presence at schools. Finally, we find no evidence of substitution effects among possible beverage product alternatives. Our analysis therefore suggests that soft drink bans at school reduce overall soft drink consumption as school age children do not compensate for this limited availability at home