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Mixed Findings (mixed + finding)
Selected AbstractsCase for and against specificity of depression in Alzheimer's diseasePSYCHIATRY AND CLINICAL NEUROSCIENCES, Issue 4 2010Christian Even MD Aims:, The aims of this study were to assess the epidemiological, phenomenological, and pathophysiological evidence that suggests the specificity of depression associated with Alzheimer's disease (AD). Methods:, We reviewed the English-language literature. Results:, Depression occurs significantly more often in patients with AD than in the general elderly population. While development of depression in response to the disability and emotional stress of AD may be a contributory factor in some patients, several studies showed that depression was not, or was only seldom, related to self-awareness of AD and these studies could not explain the high prevalence figures. To overcome the overlapping phenomenology of the two diseases, specific diagnostic criteria have been developed for depression in this context. Mixed findings have come from neuropathological and neuroimaging studies, with some evidence linking the underlying neural substrate of AD and depression, suggesting an overlapping cause of primary depression and depression comorbid with AD. Few randomized controlled trials for depression associated with AD have been conducted, with rather poor results for the use of antidepressants. Conclusions:, Currently, depression associated with AD is not considered a separate disorder by regulatory authorities and is unlikely to be considered as such in the near future. Several obstacles remain to support such a specific position, including the heterogenous nature of depression in general and within AD itself, the lack of a distinct set of symptoms, and limited treatment. [source] Understanding the design of information technologies for knowledge management in organizations: a pragmatic perspectiveINFORMATION SYSTEMS JOURNAL, Issue 2 2007Tom Butler Abstract., Researchers report mixed findings on the successful application of information technologies (IT) for knowledge management (KM). The primary difficulty is argued to be the use of information management techniques and concepts to design and develop KM Tools. Also problematic is the existence of a multiplicity of KM technologies, the application and use of which differs across organizations. This paper argues that these problems stem, in part, from the information system field's over-reliance on design concepts from the functionalist paradigm. Hence, our contention that alternative perspectives, which bring into focus issues of ontology and epistemology, need to be brought to bear in order to understand the challenges involved in the design and deployment of IT artefacts in knowledge management systems (KMS). The philosophy of technology, with its emphasis on the primacy of praxis, and which incorporates ontological and epistemological concepts from phenomenology and hermeneutics, is applied to the findings of a participative action research study to illustrate how social actors interpret and understand worldly phenomena and subsequently share their knowledge of the life-world using IT. The outcome of this marriage of situated practical theory and philosophy is a set of design principles to guide the development of a core KM Tool for KMS. [source] Should amenorrhea be a diagnostic criterion for anorexia nervosa?INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EATING DISORDERS, Issue 7 2009Evelyn Attia MD Abstract Objective: The removal of the amenorrhea criterion for anorexia nervosa (AN) is being considered for the fifth edition of The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-V). This article presents and discusses the arguments for maintaining as well as those for removing the criterion. Method: The psychological and biological literatures on the utility of amenorrhea as a distinguishing diagnostic criterion for AN and as an indicator of illness severity are reviewed. Results: The findings suggest that the majority of differences among patients with AN who do and do not meet the amenorrhea criterion appear largely to reflect nutritional status. Overall, the two groups have few psychological differences. There are mixed findings regarding biological differences between those with AN who do and do not menstruate and the relationship between amenorrhea and bone health among patients with AN. Discussion: Based on these findings, one option is to describe amenorrhea in DSM-V as a frequent occurrence among individuals with AN that may provide important information about clinical severity, but should not be maintained as a core diagnostic feature. The possibilities of retaining the criterion or eliminating it altogether are discussed. © 2009 American Psychiatric Association. Int J Eat Disord 2009 [source] Across-sample Incomparability of R2s and Additional Evidence on Value Relevance Changes Over TimeJOURNAL OF BUSINESS FINANCE & ACCOUNTING, Issue 7-8 2007Zhaoyang GuArticle first published online: 9 OCT 200 Abstract:, Given the increasing popularity of across-sample R2 comparisons in accounting research, this paper illustrates why the regression R2s are incomparable across samples and the general nature of this problem. The regression residual dispersion with proper control for scale is proposed as the alternative measure of explanatory power for across-sample comparisons. In market-on-accounting variable regressions, this measure can be conveniently interpreted as the degree of accounting-based pricing errors and be used as a measure of value relevance of accounting information. As an application, the issue of over-time value relevance changes is re-visited. In contrast to prior mixed findings based on the R2 measure, a decline of value relevance since the early 1970s is robustly detected using the alternative measure. [source] SELF-ESTEEM AND JOB PERFORMANCE: THE MODERATING ROLE OF SELF-ESTEEM CONTINGENCIESPERSONNEL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 3 2010D. LANCE FERRIS Although theoretical perspectives suggest self-esteem level (i.e., high/low) should have main and moderating effects on job performance, empirical and narrative reviews of the literature suggest such effects are either nonexistent or highly variable. To account for these mixed findings, we hypothesized that self-esteem level should only have main and moderating effects on job performance when one's self-esteem is not contingent upon workplace performance. Using multisource ratings across 2 samples of working adults, we found that the importance of performance to self-esteem (IPSE) moderated the effect of self-esteem level on job performance and moderated the buffering interaction between self-esteem level and role conflict in the prediction of job performance. Our results thus support IPSE as an important moderator of both main and moderating effects of self-esteem level. [source] The association between effort,reward imbalance and coronary atherosclerosis in a Chinese sampleAMERICAN JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL MEDICINE, Issue 7 2010Weixian Xu MD Abstract Background Previous studies of job strain and coronary heart disease (CHD) have produced mixed findings. We aimed to examine the association between job stress evaluated by the effort,reward imbalance (ERI) model and coronary atherosclerosis assessed by coronary angiography in a Chinese sample. Methods Three-hundred twenty participants accepting coronary angiography for the first time were enrolled in series. Job stressors were evaluated by the ERI model. The presence and severity of CHD were assessed by measuring the coronary artery stenosis (the presence of >50% luminal stenosis in one or more major coronary arteries). The association between job stressors and CHD was examined by multivariate analysis. Results Compared with the low-level group, high-level effort, overcommitment, and ERI increased CHD risk with odds ratio (OR) 2.5 (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.2,5.0), 2.5 (95% CI: 1.2,5.0), 2.4 (95% CI: 1.2,4.9), respectively, after adjustment for confounders. They were also significantly positively correlated with the complexity of coronary artery lesions, respectively. Dose,response relationships were observed. Conclusions ERI was associated with coronary artery lesions in a sample of Chinese workers. Longitudinal research and interventional designs are needed to confirm the mechanism and to provide evidence for the prevention of CHD. Am. J. Ind. Med. 53:655,661, 2010. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Birth Order Effects and Rebelliousness: Political Activism and Involvement with MarijuanaPOLITICAL PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 2 2002Richard L. Zweigenhaft Frank Sulloway (1996) has claimed that later-borns are more likely to rebel against the status quo than are firstborns. The two studies reported here attempt to examine more fully Sulloway's claims about rebelliousness. The studies draw on archival data from studies of high school and college students in a midwestern state between 1969 and 1982. The current studies compare the effects of birth order, gender, family size, and father's education on two self-report measures: participation in protests and demonstrations, and involvement with marijuana. The data on involvement with marijuana provided support for Sulloway's thesis that later-borns are more rebellious than firstborns, but the data on participation in protests and demonstrations did not. These mixed findings, which contribute to the ongoing debate about Sulloway's theory, are discussed. [source] The Changing Nature of Presidential Policy Making on International AgreementsPRESIDENTIAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 3 2006GLEN S. KRUTZ Why are executive agreements (EAs), rather than treaties, increasingly used to formalize U.S. relations with other countries? We examine this question from two perspectives. In the first, known as the "evasion" hypothesis, presidents act strategically to evade the Senate when governing circumstances are difficult. This strategic view reflects the conventional wisdom. Second, we consider whether organizational efficiency drives presidential use of EAs. As the number of countries increases, requiring more international agreements, it becomes necessary to rely more on an efficient mechanism to "get things done." We test these rival hypotheses by analyzing EA use as a percentage of all international agreements, as well as a subset of important EAs, from 1949 to 1998. In contrast to the conventional wisdom, we find consistent support for the efficiency hypothesis and only mixed support for the evasion hypothesis. Within these mixed findings, an interesting trend emerges. As expected, presidents act more strategically on the subset of important agreements, but this behavior appears to be driven by the ideological makeup of the Senate rather than partisan cleavages. [source] Revisiting Shareholder Value Creation via International Joint Ventures: Examining Interactions Among Firm- and Context-Specific VariablesCANADIAN JOURNAL OF ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCES, Issue 2 2004Hemant Merchant This study attempts to empirically reconcile the prevalent mixed findings regarding reactions of capital markets to announcements of American firms' participation in international joint ventures (IJVs). It does so by first admitting salient contextual variables into the portfolio of firm-specific variables,heretofore mostly considered in isolation,and then modeling their collective impact on these parents' shareholder value. A cluster analysis of more than 700 equity IJVs yields findings that highlight important interactions between the two sets of variables, which better inform creation and destruction of shareholder value for IJV parents. These findings facilitate development of a conceptual framework for assessing how parents can exploit the inter-connectedness between their firm-specific and contextual domains. Thus, this study lays a foundation for generating more refined predictions about shareholder value creation via IJVs. Résumé La présente étude essaie de concilier, de façon empirique, les conclusions contradictoires, révélées par l'étude des réactions des marchés de capitaux aux annonces par les firmes américaines de leur participation aux coentreprises internationales. Elle y parvient en deux temps: premièrement, par la reconnaissance des variables contextuelles fondamentales, jusque-là surtout considérées de façon isolée, dans le portfolio des variables spécifiques aux firmes; deuxièmement, par la modélisation de leur impact collectif sur la création des valeurs pour les actionnaires des firmes impliquées dans ces coentreprises. Les conclusions tirées de l'analyse par segments de plus de 700 coentreprises boursières internationales mettent en évidence d'importantes interactions (entre les deux groupes de variables) dans la création et la destruction des valeurs pour les actionnaires des coentreprises internationales. De façon incidente, les conclusions de l'étude tracent les contours d'un cadre conceptuel permettant de montrer comment les partenaires peuvent exploiter l'interrelation entre leurs secteurs spécifiques et les domaines contextuels. En somme, l'étude jette les bases d'une meilleure capacité de prédiction dans la création des valeurs par les actionnaires, via les coentreprises internationales. [source] | |||||||||||||||||||