Multivariate preference models for scoring or ranking units

Measuring individuals' preferences for goods and services has recently obtained considerable attention in both public and private contexts. Individuals' judgments are used for many different purposes, including setting social policies and forecating the acceptance of a new product in the market. While preference modeling is a long-studying problem, modern applications, related to the web, make it an actual topic. Respondents are called to express their preferences among a set of alternatives and collected data can be represented in various kinds of matrices. This thesis is focused on some popular methods to estimate either scores or ranks of a set of alternatives by analyzing a generalized tournament matrix. The proposed methods are compared via simulation and some special situations are investigated to detect their reliability. Our aim is to compare methods that assume parametric hypotheses on data distribution with methods that do not require such hypotheses. When respondents do not compare directly two alternatives, the matrix representing their preferences may show one or more missing values. We propose a method to estimate the missing entries of a generalized tournament matrix based on the minimization of the sum of its singular values, i.e. the nuclear norm. We perform some simulation studies to investigate the nuclear norm minimization effectiveness

Chapter Does an entrepreneurial spirit animate fresh graduates in their work-seeking during uncertain times?

The labour market is becoming harder and harder even for graduates. The economic difficulties added by Covid-19 restrictions worsened the graduates’ employability. In our opinion, public authorities should intervene to soften the school-to-work transition and graduates should become more entrepreneurial to overcome own market difficulties. We realised a survey on graduates from Padua University, the largest university in the Veneto region, Italy. In this survey, among other things, the entrepreneurial spirit of graduates was investigated. This spirit is intended as both the propensity to undertake an own business and the skill to find own ways and resources to overcome the possible difficulties while searching for a job either as employee or self-employed. It emerged that the propensity to start an own business concerns only a bunch of fresh graduates and that the capacity to implement personality resources is large among young people but remains unexplored because of cultural and contingent reasons

Future Scenarios and Support Interventions for the Family: Involving Expert's Participation though a Mixed-Method Research Study

From a recent Delphi survey on the possible scenarios that will involve the family in the next ten years, some situations emerged, judged by the experts as particularly relevant, concerning the growing conditioning due to the professional commitments for women in organizing family life, the greater tendency of young adults living to their parents and the intensity of solidarity networks between generations. On the basis of some focus groups, eight possible intervention proposals have been identified to deal with any difficulties related to the emerged scenario and, in particular, to support women and families. In order to rank them according to their efficacy and feasibility, the multi-criteria decision-making technique Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) will be applied. Key words: Family studies, Future studies, Delphi, AHP, scenario research methodolog

Chapter Psychometric properties of a new scale for measuring academic positive psychological capital

Positive psychological capital (PsyCap) is the name given to a set of psychological dimensions (hope, resilience, self-efficacy, and optimism) that may support students in their effort to achieve better academic results and even improve the employability of graduates. These dimensions could help students to achieve better academic results and impact fresh graduates’ ability to stand the labour market in times of crisis. A scale, called Academic PsyCap, was specifically developed to evaluate the four PsyCap dimensions among students and fresh graduates. To deeply investigate the structural validity of the scale, three alternative models (one-factor model, correlated four-factor model, bifactor model) were run on the responses provided by about 1,600 fresh graduates at the University of Padua. The results indicated that the bifactor model fit the data better than the other two models. In this model, all items significantly loaded on both their own domain specific factor and on the general factor. The values of Percentage of Uncontaminated Correlations (PUC), Explained Common Variance (ECV), and Hierarchical Omega suggested that multidimensionality in the scale was not severe enough to disqualify the use of a total PsyCap score. The scale was found to be invariant across gender and academic degree (bachelor’s and master’s degree). Internal consistency indices were satisfactory for the four dimensions and the total scale

Chapter Measuring content validity of academic psychological capital and locus of control in fresh graduates

Positive psychological capital (PsyCap; hope, resilience, self-efficacy, and optimism) and locus of control (LoC; internal and external) denote psychological dimensions which have been identified as crucial resources for occupational satisfaction and success. These dimensions could impact fresh graduates’ ability to stand the labour market in times of crisis. Two instruments, called Academic PsyCap and Academic LoC, have been specifically developed to evaluate these dimensions among fresh graduates. The two instruments consist of 34 and 10 items respectively, which have been selected, through factor analyses, from a large initial pool of items administered to fresh graduated at the University of Padova. Results suggested adequate psychometric properties for both Academic PsyCap and Academic LoC. The factor structure of the two instruments was confirmed (CFI = .92, RMSEA = .07, SRMR = .07 for Academic PsyCap; CFI = .96, RMSEA = .05, SRMR = .05 for Academic LoC), and internal consistency was satisfactory for all the subscales. The two instruments are presented, and their psychometric properties are described

SOGS-RA gambling scores and substance use in adolescents

Background and aims There is a well-established association between pathological gambling and substance use disorders in adolescents. The aim of this study was to shed light on the association between adolescents’ different levels of involvement in gambling activities and substance use (smoking tobacco and cannabis and drinking alcoholic beverages), based on a large sample. Methods A survey was conducted in 2013 on 34,746 students attending 619 secondary schools, who formed a representative sample of the Italian 15- to 19-year-old population. The prevalence of different categories of gamblers was estimated by age group and gender. A multiple correspondence analysis (CA) was conducted to explain the multivariate associations between substance use and gambling. Results The prevalence of problem gambling was 2.7% among the 15- to 17-year-olds, and rose to 3.6% among the 18- and 19-year-olds. Multiple CA revealed that, even when it does not reach risk-related or problem levels, gambling is associated with the use of alcohol and tobacco. In particular, the analysis showed that non-problem gambling levels were associated with alcohol and tobacco use at least once in the previous month, and that higher-risk gambling levels related to the use of cannabis and episodes of drunkenness at least once in the previous month. Conclusion This study found that any gambling behavior, even below risk-related or problem levels, was associated with some degree of substance use by youths, and that adolescents’ levels of gambling lay along a continuum of the categories of substance use

Multivariate preference models for scoring or ranking units

Measuring individuals' preferences for goods and services has recently obtained considerable attention in both public and private contexts. Individuals' judgments are used for many different purposes, including setting social policies and forecating the acceptance of a new product in the market. While preference modeling is a long-studying problem, modern applications, related to the web, make it an actual topic. Respondents are called to express their preferences among a set of alternatives and collected data can be represented in various kinds of matrices. This thesis is focused on some popular methods to estimate either scores or ranks of a set of alternatives by analyzing a generalized tournament matrix. The proposed methods are compared via simulation and some special situations are investigated to detect their reliability. Our aim is to compare methods that assume parametric hypotheses on data distribution with methods that do not require such hypotheses. When respondents do not compare directly two alternatives, the matrix representing their preferences may show one or more missing values. We propose a method to estimate the missing entries of a generalized tournament matrix based on the minimization of the sum of its singular values, i.e. the nuclear norm. We perform some simulation studies to investigate the nuclear norm minimization effectiveness.Conoscere le opinioni e le preferenze degli individui su beni o servizi, ha da sempre rivestito notevole importanza, in contesti sia pubblici che privati. Le preferenze delle persone vengono, infatti, rilevate per diversi scopi, come il definire nuove politiche sociali o il valutare se un nuovo prodotto potrà essere recepito sul mercato. Le applicazioni moderne dell'analisi delle preferenze, connesse al web, lo rendono un argomento attuale. Il punto di partenza è l'espressione da parte di un campione di individui delle proprie preferenze in merito alle possibili alternative di un insieme. I criteri per rilevare le preferenze sono numerosi. In questa tesi si presentano alcuni metodi per stimare i punteggi o i ranghi delle alternative partendo da un matrice con struttura di rilevazione a torneo generalizzata. Vengono realizzate alcune simulazioni allo scopo di confrontare i metodi proposti e di investigare alcune situazioni particolari utili a verificarne la affidabilità. L'obiettivo della tesi è di confrontare metodi che assumono ipotesi parametriche sulla distribuzione dei dati e metodi che non richiedono ipotesi. Nella tesi, inoltre, si propone un metodo per stimare un dato non validamente espresso in una matrice di torneo generalizzata. Il metodo si basa sulla minimizzazione della somma dei valori singolari, vale a dire la norma nucleare, della stessa matrice. Inoltre, sono effettuate simulazioni allo scopo di analizzare l'efficacia del metodo di stima basato sulla minimizzazione della norma nucleare

Salary Acceptability and Substitution Factors for Graduates\u2019 Employment

In this paper, we aim to understand the extent to which salary is negotiable for graduates when they search for a job after graduation. To this end, we created an experimental survey designed to identify their salary expectations. Graduates from an Italian university were randomized into four salary levels and asked about their willingness to accept a job with a predefined salary level. Moreover, in order to highlight the job aspects that could substitute salary considerations at the decision-making stage, we contrasted a hypothetical salary reduction with nine non-monetary aspects. In addition, the salary level associated with graduates\u2019 ideal job was explored. The data analysis showed that a new graduate hesitates if presented with a job offer implying a tradeoff between career prospects, work roles, and contractual advantages on the one hand, and salary on the other hand. Moreover, salary expectations differ according to gender, educational pathways, and other social and attitudinal variables