Restricted Opportunities, Personal Choices, Ineffective Policies: What Explains Food Insecurity in Oregon?

This study examines the extent to which household demographics, local economic and social conditions, and federal food security programs explain the likelihood of household food insecurity in Oregon. Between 1999 and 2001, Oregon had the highest average rate of hunger in the nation and ranked in the top five states with respect to food insecurity. Statistical analyses using a multivariate logit model reveal that food insecurity is influenced by much more than demographics and individual choices. County-level factors such as residential location (urban versus rural) and housing costs significantly affect the likelihood that families will be food insecure.food insecurity, food stamps, hunger, rural residence, Food Security and Poverty,

Two Kinds of Quakers: A Latent Class Analysis

A latent class analysis was applied to 531 respondents to the Making New Friends survey of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). We found two distinct patterns of religious beliefs-those in Group G want a deeper and personal relationship with God, while those in Group S are more interested in social testimonies and generally do not believe in a personal God

Propagation of optical excitations by dipolar interactions in metal nanoparticle chains

Dispersion relations for dipolar modes propagating along a chain of metal nanoparticles are calculated by solving the full Maxwell equations, including radiation damping. The nanoparticles are treated as point dipoles, which means the results are valid only for a/d <= 1/3, where a is the particle radius and d the spacing. The discrete modes for a finite chain are first calculated, then these are mapped onto the dispersion relations appropriate for the infinite chain. Computed results are given for a chain of 50-nm diameter Ag spheres spaced by 75 nm. We find large deviations from previous quasistatic results: Transverse modes interact strongly with the light line. Longitudinal modes develop a bandwidth more than twice as large, resulting in a group velocity that is more than doubled. All modes for which k_mode <= w/c show strongly enhanced decay due to radiation damping.Comment: 26 pages, 7 figures, 2 tables. to appear in Phys. Rev.

Challenges in Estimating the Causal Effect of an Intervention with Pre-Post Data (Part 1): Definition & Identification of the Causal Parameter

There is mixed evidence of the effectiveness of interventions operating on a large scale. Although the lack of consistent results is generally attributed to problems of implementation or governance of the program, the failure to find a statistically significant effect (or the success of finding one) may be due to choices made in the evaluation. To demonstrate the potential limitations and pitfalls of the usual analytic methods used for estimating causal effects, we apply the first half of a roadmap for causal inference to a pre-post evaluation of a community-level, national nutrition program. Selection into the program was non-random and strongly associated with the pre-treatment (lagged) outcome. Using structural causal models (SCM), directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) and simulated data, we demonstrate that a post treatment estimand controls for confounding by the lagged outcome but not from possible unmeasured confounders. Two separate difference-in-differences estimands have the potential to adjust for a certain type of unmeasured confounding, but introduce bias if the additional assumptions they require are not met. Our results reveal an important issue of identifiability when estimating the causal effect of a program with pre-post observational data. A careful appraisal of the assumptions underlying the causal model is imperative before committing to a statistical model and progressing to estimation

Objektiv strukturierte Bewertung einer Hautnaht am Modell : ist die direkte Beobachtung der video-basierten Beobachtung überlegen? ; Poster

Poster Einleitung: OSCEs werden immer häufiger in der Ausbildung von Studierenden eingesetzt. Die Einführung eines OSCEs im fach Chirurgie ist in Planung. Durch die große Anzahl von Studierenden pro Semester oder Studienjahr (400 Studierende in Frankfurt) ist die Durchführung einer OSCE Prüfung mit großem personellen Aufwand verbunden. Vor allem während der Prüfung müssen eine Vielzahl von Chirurgen simultan zu Prüfungszwecken zur Verfügung stehen. Ziel der Studie war es, zu überprüfen, ob eine video-basierte Bewertung einer „Nahtstation“ zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt zu gleichen Ergebnissen in der Bewertung der Leistung der Studierenden führt. Methode: 33 Studierende führten unter standardisierten Bedingungen eine Hautnaht an einem Modell durchzuführen. Die Studierenden wurden während der Prozedur von zwei prüfenden Chirurgen und zwei Studierenden im PJ (praktischen Jahr) beobachtet und anhand einer objektiv strukturierten Checkliste bewertet (Prozessevaluation). Die Prozedur wurde gleichzeitig auf Video aufgezeichnet und zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt zwei weiteren Chirurgen und zwei weiteren Studierenden im PJ zur Bewertung gezeigt. Ergebnisse: Der Vergleich zwischen "live“-prüfenden und "video“-prüfenden Chirurgen zeigt eine signifikant hohe Korrelation (r=0,87; p<0,01) und eine hohe Übereinstimmung (88,2%) in der Bewertung. Ebenso zeigen die prüfenden PJler eine signifikant hohe Korrelation (r=0,84; p<0,01). Die Übereinstimmung ist bei den PJlern mit (82.4%) etwas niedriger als bei den beteiligten Chirurgen. Zusammenfassung: Mit dieser Studie konnte zeigt werden, daß es bei der Beurteilung der Performance von Studierenden bei einer Hautnaht am Modell unter Anwendung von objektiv strukturierten Checklisten möglich ist, eine direkte Beobachtung der Studierenden durch eine video-basierte Beobachtung zu ersetzen. Eine "Nahtstation“ in einem OSCE kann somit während der Prüfungszeit ohne Prüfer auskommen und im Anschluß bewertet werden

Effect of Passive Integrated Transponder Tag Implantation Site on Tag Retention, Growth, and Survival of Two Sizes of Juvenile Bluegills and Yellow Perch

Passive integrated transponder (PIT) tags are commonly used to monitor growth, habitat use, activity rates, and survival of individual fish. However, for successful completion of research objectives, the tags must be retained and must not affect fish growth or survival. We compared the effects of PIT tagging location on tag retention, growth, and survival of juvenile bluegills Lepomis macrochirus and yellowperch Perca flavescens. In total, 80 bluegills and 80 yellow perch from two size-classes (75–101 and 128–162 mm total length) were randomly assigned to a control or to one of three tagging location treatments: isthmus, body cavity, or dorsal musculature. Fish received daily ad libitum rations and were monitored for survival. On days 14, 28, and 42, the fish were measured, weighed, and checked for tag retention. Use of the isthmus as a tagging location resulted in lower tag retention for both species and both size-classes relative to the body cavity and dorsal musculature locations. Tagging location had no detectable effect on growth or survival responses for either species or either size-class. Thus, PIT tags that are implanted in the dorsal musculature of large juvenile bluegills and yellow perch and in the body cavity of small juvenile bluegills and yellow perch can have high retention with minimal adverse effects

Incorporating Uncertainties in Atomic Data Into the Analysis of Solar and Stellar Observations: A Case Study in Fe XIII

Information about the physical properties of astrophysical objects cannot be measured directly but is inferred by interpreting spectroscopic observations in the context of atomic physics calculations. Ratios of emission lines, for example, can be used to infer the electron density of the emitting plasma. Similarly, the relative intensities of emission lines formed over a wide range of temperatures yield information on the temperature structure. A critical component of this analysis is understanding how uncertainties in the underlying atomic physics propagates to the uncertainties in the inferred plasma parameters. At present, however, atomic physics databases do not include uncertainties on the atomic parameters and there is no established methodology for using them even if they did. In this paper we develop simple models for the uncertainties in the collision strengths and decay rates for Fe XIII and apply them to the interpretation of density sensitive lines observed with the EUV Imagining spectrometer (EIS) on Hinode. We incorporate these uncertainties in a Bayesian framework. We consider both a pragmatic Bayesian method where the atomic physics information is unaffected by the observed data, and a fully Bayesian method where the data can be used to probe the physics. The former generally increases the uncertainty in the inferred density by about a factor of 5 compared with models that incorporate only statistical uncertainties. The latter reduces the uncertainties on the inferred densities, but identifies areas of possible systematic problems with either the atomic physics or the observed intensities.Comment: in press at Ap

distinct: a novel approach to differential distribution analyses

We present distinct, a general method for differential analysis of full distributions that is well suited to applications on single-cell data, such as single-cell RNA sequencing and high-dimensional flow or mass cytometry data. High-throughput single-cell data reveal an unprecedented view of cell identity and allow complex variations between conditions to be discovered; nonetheless, most methods for differential expression target differences in the mean and struggle to identify changes where the mean is only marginally affected. distinct is based on a hierarchical non-parametric permutation ap- proach and, by comparing empirical cumulative distribution functions, iden- tifies both differential patterns involving changes in the mean, as well as more subtle variations that do not involve the mean. We performed extensive bench- marks across both simulated and experimental datasets from single-cell RNA sequencing and mass cytometry data, where distinct shows favourable per- formance, identifies more differential patterns than competitors, and displays good control of false positive and false discovery rates. distinct is available as a Bioconductor R package

Hinode Calibration for Precise Image Co-alignment between SOT and XRT (November 2006 -- April 2007)

To understand the physical mechanisms for activity and heating in the solar atmosphere, the magnetic coupling from the photosphere to the corona is an important piece of information from the Hinode observations, and therefore precise positional alignment is required among the data acquired by different telescopes. The Hinode spacecraft and its onboard telescopes were developed to allow us to investigate magnetic coupling with co-alignment accuracy better than 1 arcsec. Using the Mercury transit observed on 8 November 2006 and co-alignment measurements regularly performed on a weekly basis, we have determined the information necessary for precise image co-alignment and have confirmed that co-alignment better than 1 arcsec can be realized between Solar Optical Telescope (SOT) and X-Ray Telescope (XRT) with our baseline co-alignment method. This paper presents results from the calibration for precise co-alignment of CCD images from SOT and XRT.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in PASJ (Hinode Special issue

Association of collective attitudes and contraceptive practice in nine sub-Saharan African countries.

BACKGROUND: There is ample evidence that gender norms affect contraceptive practice; however, data are mostly qualitative with limited geographical scope. We investigated that association quantitatively using collective community-level attitudes towards premarital sex and wife-beating as proxies for gender norms. METHODS: Data came from nationally representative Demographic and Health Surveys (2005-2009) for women of reproductive age (15-49 years) in nine sub-Saharan African countries. Using multilevel logistic models, controlling for individual covariates and community-level indicators of women's empowerment, we assessed the community-level association of gender norms regarding premarital sex and wife-beating with individual contraception uptake and demand satisfied among fecund sexually active women. Norms were approximated as 'collective attitudinal norms' from female/male residents (aged 15-49 years) from the same community. We assessed the magnitude and significance of the community-level effects and attributed variance across communities. The same analysis was replicated for each country. RESULTS: In a fully-adjusted model with a pooled sample of 24?404 adolescent women, the odds of contraception use increased with a 1 standard deviation (SD) increase in the variation of collective permissive attitudes towards premarital sex of female (odds ratio (OR)?=?1.08, 95% confidence interval (CI)?=?1.02-1.15) and male (OR?=?1.11, 95% CI?=?1.05-1.17) peers (15-24 years), while odds of contraceptive use declined by 10% (OR?=?0.90, 95% CI?=?0.85-0.96) with collective accepting attitudes towards wife-beating of women aged 15-49 years. Similar results were found in separate models that controlled for adults' permissive attitudes towards premarital sex. The community-level attributed variance (V2?=?1.62, 95% CI?=?1.45-1.80) represented 33% (intra-class correlation (ICC)?=?33.0, 95% CI?=?30.0-35.4) of the total variation of contraception use, and attitudes towards premarital sex and violence jointly explained nearly 26% of that V2 variance. The community-level shared of attributed variation of contraceptive use varied significantly across countries, from 3.5% in Swaziland (ICC?=?3.5, 95% CI?=?0.8-13.7) to 60.2% in Nigeria (OR?=?60.2, 95% CI?=?56.0-64.2). CONCLUSIONS: Overall, significant positive associations of collective permissive attitudes of both adolescent and adult women towards premarital sex were found for use of, and demand for, contraception, whereas collective accepting attitudes towards wife-beating were negatively associated with the use and demand for contraception. Ours is the first study to define quantitatively the influence of proxies for gender norms at the community level on women's family planning decisions. These findings offer new insights for understanding the role of sex-related attitudes and norms as important factors in shaping contraceptive practices and improving the effectiveness of family planning policies by targeting individuals as well as their groups of influence