Generation recession? How the recession may change America

Nobody yet knows the ultimate footprint that the Great Recession will have on the nation. We do know that much of it depends on the choices that Americans make in response—everything from personal saving to labor force participation is in play. Ultimately, these choices will help determine how “great” the recession really turns out to be.Unemployment ; Recessions

Potential Effect of an Apoprotein B-based Algorithm on Management of New Patients with Hypertriglyceridemia Referred to a Specialty Lipid Clinic

Background In patients with hypertriglyceridemia, non-high density lipoprotein cholesterol (nonHDL-C) is a targeted goal. However, apoprotein B100 (apoB) may be superior in predicting cardiovascular risk so we assessed the utility of an apoB-based. Methods New patients (n = 125) who had both apoB and standard lipids measured on the same day were included and we determined the concordances of having achieved goal lipid levels based upon proposed apoB versus nonHDL-C (ATP III) targets in patients with elevated TG (≥150 mg·dl −1 ) levels. Results Although apoB was correlated with nonHDL-C (r = 0.47, p ≤ 0.001), the tests had only a fair level of agreement when categorizing the percentage of patients achieving lipid goals for their degree of cardiovascular risk (Κ = 0.22). Among patients with an elevation in nonHDL-C above ATP III goals, between 12–42% had achieved target apoB. On the contrary, between 44–50% of patients were found to be at nonHDL-C but not apoB target. The results were not substantively altered if the analyses were confined to patients with TG values between 200–499 mg·dl −1 , rather than all patients with TG levels ≥ 150 mg·dl −1 , as specifically outlined in ATP III guidelines. In total, > 50% of all subjects would have been treated either more or less aggressively following an apoB-based therapeutic algorithm. Conclusions Our findings confirm that the majority of patients referred with hypertriglyceridemia would be managed differently by following an apoB-based treatment algorithm compared to ATP III guidelines. Although many patients would be candidates for more intense therapy, many would be treated less aggressively. Copyright © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/62999/1/20399_ftp.pd

Advice-Versa

Much of what passes for advice is, on examination, self-contradictory, Never give anyone advice, Don\u27t listen to what others tell you, God-damn all profanity, and Avoid iambic meter, son are examples. In the quiz below, thirty bits of paradoxical linguistic advice have been split into two parts, the first in the left-hand column and the second in the right-hand one. Can you re-combine each half with its illogical mate? Answers are found in Answers and Solutions at the end of this issue

Nationali-Tease

The words we use to refer to people from various countries do not always follow a predictable pattern. Thus, someone from Switzerland is Swiss, from Wales Welsh, and from Holland Dutch. Each sentence below contains the name of a country and an adjective describing the nationality of the country\u27s inhabitants. Letters that are identical in both words have been omitted. In each case the answer is unique

Rejoinders

Would you like to join the tennis club? I\u27d LOVE to! How about the Sierra Club? NATURally! And the cereal club? Not on your LIFE! The Action Club? AFFIRMATIVE! You get the idea. In the two puzzles below, try to match each invitation in the left-hand column with the appropriate reJOINder in the right-hand column. If you think some are unforgivably awful puns, join the club! Se Answers and Solutions for the answers

Noun-Sense

Normally, to change an adjective into a noun, we add NESS (cute, cuteness) or ITY (popular, popularity). But there are many exceptions, some of which seem to follow a pattern and some of which seem to be unique

Paper Caper

The object of this game is to find more sets of rhyming words on a particular page than your opponents. To start the game, each player is given a magazine or book, which s/he should open to nay page s/he wishes. Players are then given a specified amount of time (three minutes seems reasonable) to find and write down sets of rhyming words on the page in front of them. To qualify as a rhyme, two words must have the same number of syllables, must be accented on the same syllable, must have different sounds at the beginning of the accented syllable, and must share identical sounds from the middle of the accented syllable to the end of the word. (By these criteria, CONFLATION and INFLATION do not rhyme.

The Problem with Progressive Pedagogy: Systemic Challenges Enacting Environmental Sustainability Education

This outlines theories for building a coordinated interdisciplinary school-wide energy sustainability program in a Toronto high school, and barriers to its success. It explores the intersection of eco and social justice, systems thinking, pedagogy in schools, and sustainable practices in business. To say it is a challenge solving real-world justice problems in a high school is an understatement. It requires ongoing support, communication and collaboration from all levels of the education system, which is tricky to coordinate, even in a small school. The aim was to prove that through progressive pedagogy, students learn curricular content and skills needed for a sustainable future by innovating ways to solve real life sustainability problems in energy in the local community. Local support existed in theory, but on a practical level there was a lack of time, budget, scheduling, communication and resources needed to put theory into practice, despite interest and willingness on the part of students, staff, and administration. This paper, then, is an outline of what not to do when designing progressive pedagogies, what to keep in mind for best practices, and options for designing integrated project and problem based pedagogy that teaches skills for the future. It outlines basic theories of systems thinking, sustainable business and justice work that focuses for this project on energy. It defines current policies on different levels of the education system in terms of sustainability in schools. It reveals the success and barriers of creating an interdisciplinary program through an educator’s journal. And it outlines the key findings of the study, articulating multiple barriers on multiple levels of the system. It proposes communication linked to multiple viewpoints and systems thinking, and offers an example of adapting to barriers to make small gains despite them. It also offers recommendations for how stakeholders throughout the education system can advocate for systemic reform to integrate learning and innovating for a sustainable future within schools

Neighborhood information and home mortgage lending.

An examination of how information about a neighborhood affects the level of lending activity in it--specifically, whether lenders deny mortgage applications at higher rates in neighborhoods where they have little experience in evaluating applications and/or where the lending community in general lacks such experience.Mortgages ; Discrimination in mortgage loans

Disconfirming managerial communication, its impact on employee felt emotions and the moderating roles of relationship quality, trait negative affect and emotion regulation

The purpose of this study was to explore the impacts of disconfirming managerial communication on employee felt emotions, and whether this impact was influenced by the employee's personality, emotion regulation strategies, and the quality of the manager-employee relationship. Two hundred and seventy-five working adults rated the extent to which their managers used disconfirming and confirming communication with them during disagreement discussions. They also rated the positive and negative emotions they experienced as a result of these discussions, their overall relationship quality with their managers, their trait positive and negative affect at work, and the degree to which they regulated their emotions by expressive suppression, and cognitive reappraisal. Results showed that, as hypothesized, 1) disconfirming managerial communication was positively related to employee negative felt emotion, and 2) the effect was mitigated (during disagreement discussions) by a high relationship quality between the manager and employee. 3) Also, even though disconfirming managerial communication was not found to be a negative predictor of employees' positive felt emotions, during disagreement discussions, confirming managerial communication was both a negative predictor of employee negative felt emotions, and a positive predictor of employee positive felt emotions. 4) In addition, during disagreement discussions, while the relationship between disconfirming managerial communication and negative felt emotion was stronger for employees with high trait negative affect (NA), the difference between the negative emotions associated with high disconfirming and low disconfirming communication was much greater for employees with low trait negative affect (NA). Finally, my results did not support my hypothesis that the relationship between disconfirming managerial communication and negative felt emotion would be amplified for employees who regulated their emotions using expressive suppression, and mitigated by employees who regulated their emotions using cognitive reappraisal. However, consistent with previous research, expressive suppression correlated negatively with relationship quality, and positively with trait negative affect, and scores were higher for males. Also, cognitive reappraisal correlated positively with trait positive affect and emotional stability. These findings contribute to theory and research within the fields of interpersonal communication, leader-member exchange (LMX), and emotions at work. Also, the study introduces a useful tool (the Confirming/Disconfirming Managerial Communication Indicator or C/DMCI) for, future research in this area, as well as applications in management development and appraisal. Using Affective Events Theory as the framework, previous research is both supported and extended through a more complex understanding of the specific communication behaviours involved in confirming, and disconfirming managerial communication. Findings suggest that in order to be effective, managers need to use more confirming communication behaviours, as well as fewer disconfirming ones. The results emphasize that if managers have good relationships with their employees, when they do communicate in a disconfirming manner, especially if the communication is in a disagreement context, the positive relationship will act as a buffer to the negative emotional impacts that are associated with disconfirmation. Also, the study finds that while employees with high trait negative affect personalities, who tend to be more tense and nervous, will experience more negative felt emotion during disagreements, it is the low trait negative affect employees, those who are calm and relaxed, that will notice disconfirming managerial communication the most