Ex-ante Moral Hazard and Primary Prevention, evidence from Portugal

This paper provides evidence on ex-ante moral hazard in Portugal. The issue is addressed in a setting where people buy voluntary private health insurance, on top of existing Government coverage. We identify the main factors that lead people to adopt healthy lifestyles, such as taking up sports and not smoking, which are associated with primary prevention. Moreover, it allows for an inference of the role of risk aversion of individuals in these decisions. We use a GHK recursive simulator of multivariate probit for insurance demand, smoking and sporting decisions, to provide joint estimates taking into consideration potential endogeneity of these decisions. Our results indicate that there is some evidence of ex-ante moral hazard with respect to primary prevention behaviors. Di¤erences in risk aversion across individuals do not seem to play a primary role in explaining distinct life styles.ex-ante moral hazard, prevention, lifestyles

Health Care and Health Outcomes of Migrants: Evidence from Portugal

This paper studies the performance of immigrants relative to natives, in terms of their health status, use of health care services, lifestyles, and coverage of health expenditures. We base the analysis on international evidence that identified a healthy immigrant effect, complemented by empirical research on the Portuguese National Health Survey. Furthermore, we assess whether differences in health performance depend on the personal characteristics of the individuals or can be directly associated with their migration experience.Migration, health status, health care, healthy immigrant effect, Portugal

Health Care and Health Outcomes of Migrants: Evidence from Portugal

This paper studies the performance of immigrants relative to natives, in terms of their health status, use of health care services, lifestyles, and coverage of health expenditures. We base the analysis on international evidence that identified a healthy immigrant effect, complemented by empirical research on the Portuguese National Health Survey. Furthermore, we assess whether differences in health performance depend on the personal characteristics of the individuals or can be directly associated with their migration experience.Migration, health status, health care, healthy immigrant effect, Portugal

Los espacios del libro en Castilla y Aragón a fines del Medievo

Este artículo trata de las formas y lugares en que guardaban y utilizaban sus libros bs propietarios particulares y señores laicos de las Coronas de Castilla y Aragón durante la Baja Edad Media. A partir de los testimonios documentales, respaldados por las representaciones iconográficas y los textos literarios, doctrinales y narrativos, se plantea la relación entre estos espacios para la custodia y uso de las obras escritas con el status socio-económico de su poseedor y el tipo de actividad que desempeña.This article analyzes how private owners and noblemen kept and used their books in the kingdoms of Castile and Aragón in the late Middle Ages. Using documentary evidence and iconography as well as literary, doctrinal and narrative texts, the socio-economic status of owners and their professional activities proved to be closely related to the type of space where the books were kept and used.Publicad

La intervención de la autoridad en las celebraciones religiosas: las fiestas de Benavente y su tierra (1434-1525)

Este artículo analiza la intervención del poder en las festividades religiosas de un territorio de señorío, en concreto, el de Benavente, a fines de la Edad Media. En principio, la actuación del gobierno municipal y del señor está motivada por la imagen de ambos tipos de autoridad como protectores de la Iglesia y modelos de religiosidad para los habitantes de la zona. Al mismo tiempo, obedece a la delimitación de competencias entre ambas autoridades. En este sentido, el papel decisivo corresponde a las instituciones locales. Éstas se encargan de la financiación y organización de las celebraciones solemnes, del control sobre las prácticas religiosas y del impulso a la predicación alegórica, desarrollada en el Corpus Christi. En cambio, la influencia de los condes de Benavente en estos festejos está mucho más diluida. Queda de manifiesto en la ayuda para costear los gastos de las procesiones y espectáculos y, sobre todo, en la participación de delegados suyos en algunos acuerdos del concejo relativos a estos temas.This paper analyses the intervention of power in the religious festivities of the Benavente seigneurial domain during the late Middle Ages. In principle, the local government and the lord acted as protectors of the Church and set an example of religiousness to the inhabitants of the region. At the same time, their actions reflected the share of power of both sources of authority. In this sense, the local institutions played the major role. They dealt with the financing and organizing of solemn celebrations and controlled the religious practices and the allegorical preaching that took place during the 'Corpus Christi' festivities. However, the influence of the counts of Benavente on these feasts was not so strong. This is plainly shown by the financial support they provided in order to meet the expenses of processions and entertainments, and more particularly in the participation of their representatives in council agreements concerning these topics

Modas estéticas y relaciones exteriores: la difusión de los mitos artúricos en la Corona de Castilla (s. XIII - comienzos s. XV)

Sin resume

Proving VLRL Action Properties with the Maude Model Checker

AbstractThe Verification Logic for Rewriting Logic (VLRL) is a modal action logic in which rewrite rules are captured as actions. This paper studies a possible representation of the VLRL action formulae using the Next and the Until operators of Linear Temporal Logic (LTL). In particular, it studies the use of the Maude model checker to prove VLRL action formulae. Action modalities of VLRL fix the transition that will take place in a state and the context in which it will be applied, while LTL operators do not. Thus, to represent action modalities in LTL it is necessary to transform the initial rewrite theory into a new one in which the states carry the information about the transitions used and the context in which they have taken place. VLRL properties are then studied in the transformed theory by translating VLRL formulae into equivalent LTL formulae

Assessing the drivers of green consumerism: a multi-factor analysis

In the last decades, human activity has abused the planet on an unprecedent scale leading to severe depletion of natural resources and affecting the environment. The awareness of this widespread environmental degradation changed the consumption patterns and has led to the emergence of green consumerism, creating a new opportunity for companies. Marketers are now challenged to incorporate green values into their practices and to take green marketing to its full potential. However, there is a recognized inconsistency between attitude and behavior for those who claim to care about the environment and therefore green consumerism is considered a complex behavior that needs to be scrutinized. Marketers need to address this gap in order to help protecting the environment, while assuring the financial sustainability of their companies. The main objective of this study is to provide further insights to mitigate this gap by exploring the effect of a set of multiple factors on green buying behavior. Using a quantitative methodology, results from this study show that general prosocial attitudes, receptivity to green communication, perceived green value, perceived consumer effectiveness and willingness to pay more have a positive effect over green buying behavior, while green skepticism affects it in a negative way

Biosynthetic Studies in Heterocyclic Fungal Metabolites

The tryptophan analogues, beta-(2-azaindol-3-yl)-, beta-(7-azaindol-3-yl)- and beta-(l-benzothien-3-yl)-alanine, were synthesised and fed to PeniciIlium cyclopium cultures. The three compounds caused inhibition of normal fungal growth and metabolite production. 3-Acetyl-5-(indol-3-ylraethyl)-tetramic acid, a known intermediate in cyclopiazonic acid biosynthesis, labelled with 14C, was synthesised. After administration of this compound to cultures of P. cyclopium. no radioactivity was detected in the metabolites. It is presumed that cell-wall permeability problems were responsible for this result. When grown on a replacement medium containing no exogenous nitrogen source, P. cyclopium produced alpha- and beta-cyclopiazonic acids only when small amounts of 3-acetyl-5-(indol-3-yl- methyl)tetramic acid were added. However, when 3[2H3]acetyl-5-(indol-3-2 ylmethyl)-[5-2H]tetramic acid was administered, the alpha- and beta-cyclopiazonic acids isolated contained no deuterium. These results suggest that the tetramic acid is first degraded to tryptophan, which can then lose the 2 2H-atom in a transamination reaction, prior to incorporation into the metabolites