86 research outputs found
A Multigenerational View of Inequality
The study of intergenerational mobility and most population research are governed by a two-generation (parent-to-offspring) view of intergenerational influence, to the neglect of the effects of grandparents and other ancestors and nonresident contemporary kin. While appropriate for some populations in some periods, this perspective may omit important sources of intergenerational continuity of family-based social inequality. Social institutions, which transcend individual lives, help support multigenerational influence, particularly at the extreme top and bottom of the social hierarchy, but to some extent in the middle as well. Multigenerational influence also works through demographic processes because families influence subsequent generations through differential fertility and survival, migration, and marriage patterns, as well as through direct transmission of socioeconomic rewards, statuses, and positions. Future research should attend more closely to multigenerational effects; to the tandem nature of demographic and socioeconomic reproduction; and to data, measures, and models that transcend coresident nuclear families
Educational Homogamy Lowers the Odds of Reproductive Failure
Assortative mating based on education is a common phenomenon. We investigated whether it affected parameters of reproductive performance such as childlessness, offspring number and age at first marriage. On the basis of the US census from 1980 (n = 670,631 married US couples), we find that the proportion of childless individuals is usually minimal in women married to a husband of the same educational level. This holds particularly true in the highest and the lowest educated women. Educational homogamy is also associated with a lower average age at first marriage. No obvious effect of educational homogamy on a woman's average offspring number is found, where mean offspring number generally increases both with decreasing woman's and decreasing husband's educational attainment. We conclude that educational homogamy reduces the likelihood of reproductive failure
The State Socialist Mortality Syndrome
Death rates for working-age men in European state socialist countries deviated from general improvements in survival observed in the rest of Europe during the 20th century. The magnitude of structural labor force changes across countries correlates with lagged increases in death rates for men in the working ages. This pattern is consistent with a hypothesis that hyper-development of heavy industry and stagnation (even contraction) of the service sector created anomic conditions leading to unhealthy lifestyles and self-destructive behavior among men moving from primary-sector to secondary-sector occupations. Occupational contrasts within countries similarly show concentration of rising male death rates among blue collar workers. Collapse of state socialist systems produced rapid corrections in labor force structure after 1990, again correlated with a fading of the state socialist mortality syndrome in following decades
Serum tumor markers in pediatric osteosarcoma: a summary review
Osteosarcoma is the most common primary high-grade bone tumor in both adolescents and children. Early tumor detection is key to ensuring effective treatment. Serum marker discovery and validation for pediatric osteosarcoma has accelerated in recent years, coincident with an evolving understanding of molecules and their complex interactions, and the compelling need for improved pediatric osteosarcoma outcome measures in clinical trials. This review gives a short overview of serological markers for pediatric osteosarcoma, and highlights advances in pediatric osteosarcoma-related marker research within the past year. Studies in the past year involving serum markers in patients with pediatric osteosarcoma can be assigned to one of four categories, i.e., new approaches and new markers, exploratory studies in specialized disease subsets, large cross-sectional validation studies, and longitudinal studies, with and without an intervention
Performance of the ALICE experiment at the CERN LHC
ALICE is the heavy-ion experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The experiment continuously took data during the first physics campaign of the machine from fall 2009 until early 2013, using proton and lead-ion beams. In this paper we describe the running environment and the data handling procedures, and discuss the performance of the ALICE detectors and analysis methods for various physics observables
Transitions to post-secondary and tertiary education in the Netherlands: a trend analysis of unconditional and conditional socio-economic back-ground effects
In the tracked educational system of the Netherlands, students at the end of
secondary education have to decide whether they want to enter subsequent post-secondary
or tertiary education. Depending on the previous qualification, they have the choice
between up to four different options, including not entering further education. We propose,
in line with prevalent theoretical approaches, that children from lower socio-economic
backgrounds tend to make decisions that do not fully capitalize on their previously
obtained qualifications. By means of multinomial logistic regression models we tested the
unconditional and conditional effects of family background for entering the different tracks
of post-secondary education. In the unconditional analyses we found effects for parental
education on making a transition to all types of post-secondary and tertiary education, but
the occupational status of the father seems to be only relevant for the transition to lower
tier tertiary education. The conditional effects of parental education for making the transition
to senior vocational education and university are strong, while the transition to lower
tertiary education is not influenced by parental background characteristics. This shows that
even with eligibility for the most prestigious tracks, children from lower socio-economic
backgrounds tend to make less ambitious educational decisions. We also examined to what
extent this inequality changed across time for the cohorts that terminated secondary
education between 1932 and 1995. Decreasing effects of parental education indicate that
the expansion of secondary education had the positive effect of leading more children from
lower social backgrounds into favourable secondary education tracks, especially the
intermediate general track. This equalization is carried forward through the entire sequence
of educational transitions. The students from advantaged backgrounds nevertheless still
profit from the parental resources in access to the most prestigious tertiary education institutions given secondary qualifications. Their head start into the academic track has not
been reduced across cohorts.
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