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Contains fulltext : 236270.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) Parental stress may influence adolescents' food intake and weight development over time, however, it is largely unknown why this is the case. This study examines whether the link between parental stress and adolescents' snack intake and weight outcome is mediated by food parenting practices (FPPs). Participants included 400 parents and their adolescent children (aged 12-16) who completed questionnaires. The Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) was used to assess parental general stress levels and the Adolescent Food Parenting Questionnaire (AFPQ) to assess FPPs. Multiple mediation analyses with parallel mediators were performed, with parental general stress as an independent variable and adolescent snack intake and zBMI as dependent variables. FPPs (autonomy support, coercive control, modeling, healthy structure, snack structure) were entered as mediators in the model, adjusted for covariates. Autonomy support mediated the link between parental general stress and adolescent savory snack and sweet snack intake at follow-up. Parents who reported higher stress levels provided less autonomy support, which resulted in more adolescent snacking. None of the other FPPs mediated any link between parental stress and intake or weight outcome, and no significant indirect effects were observed with zBMI as an outcome variable. Further research should replicate this finding and may further examine underlying mechanisms. 21 p.

Contains fulltext : 201996.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) This article examines the extent to which political parties affect the descriptive representation of both Western and non-Western ethnic minority groups on the candidate lists of political parties in the Netherlands. It systematically tests the role of policy positions of Dutch parties, their ethnic minority support, and candidate selection methods. As list position is related to electoral success, we study the nomination of ethnic minority candidates as well as their position on the candidate list. Using ethnic background data of all candidates for the Dutch parliamentary elections in 2012, we find that minorities of Turkish and Moroccan origin are not underrepresented, and that descriptive representation is below parity for Western minorities. We observe neither effect from parties' ethnic support on ethnic representation, nor do we find any relation between party selection procedure and ethnic minority representation. The position of parties on immigration issues, however, is shown to be important. The results indicate that parties with more restrictive positions on integration and migration not only nominate fewer ethnic minority candidates, they also place non-Western ethnic minority candidates in lower list positions than parties who are less restrictive towards migration and integration. 23 p.

Contains fulltext : 202004.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) The association between depressive symptoms and emotional eating has been well established. The aim of the current study was to examine whether the association between depressive symptoms and emotional eating was mediated by mindfulness, a construct that has successfully been implemented in the treatment of eating disorders and depression. Mindfulness, particularly, the component "acting with awareness" was theorized to decrease impulsive eating. Data from 417 Dutch adult participants were analyzed. Mediation analyses were conducted using structural equation modeling in Mplus. Of the five mindfulness subcomponents, only acting with awareness mediated the association between depressive symptoms and emotional eating. Results showed complete mediation in that the effect of depression on emotional eating was entirely carried indirectly through the mediator acting with awareness. None of the other mindfulness components mediated the depressive symptoms-emotional eating link. This indicates the potential importance of the "acting with awareness" construct, explaining why depressive symptoms would be associated with emotional eating. Future prospective research should examine whether, why and for whom acting with awareness may mediate the prospective link from depressive symptoms to emotional eating. 9 p.

Contains fulltext : 236262.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) Suitable instruments for measuring Food Parenting Practices (FPP) among adolescents and their parents that also measure the perception of adolescents about their parent's FPP are rare. The current study describes the development and preliminary testing of a short 16-item Adolescent Food Parenting Questionnaire (AFPQ) for parents (AFPQ-p) and adolescents (AFPQ-a) that may enable future large-scale research on potentially eminent parent-child FPP discrepancy. Participants included 381 parents (73.8 % mothers; Mage 45.9, 26.2% fathers; Mage 49.1) and their adolescent children (aged 12-16) who participated in the Dutch "G(F)OOD together" study. Most parents finished higher professional education (mothers: 44.3 %; fathers: 34.4 %) and performed a paid job of 32 h per week or more (mothers: 22.1 %; fathers: 60.0 %). The theoretical framework of Vaughn (2016) was leading in the development of the AFPQ. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was performed on a random split sample of parent-adolescent dyads and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed on the other half. The EFA in both parent and adolescent samples resulted in a clear 5 factor solution explaining 61.6 % (AFPQ-p) and 64.2 % (AFPQ-a) of the variance respectively, representing the factors Autonomy Support (α = 0.79/.82), Coercive Control (α = 0.85/.83), Snack Structure (α = 0.79/75), Healthy Structure (α = 0.78/74) and Modelling (α = 0.69/85). CFA confirmed good model fit for the AFPQ-p and the AFPQ-a. Associations with adolescent self-reported food intake were in the expected direction, confirming the preliminary convergent validity of the instrument among a moderate to highly educated group of parent-adolescent dyads. Although the AFPQ provides a promising short instrument, future research in more diverse samples is needed to build evidence on the instrument's psychometric characteristics in other groups. 11 p.

Contains fulltext : 166462.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) To include nominal and ordinal variables as predictors in regression models, their categories first have to be transformed into so-called 'dummy variables'. There are many transformations available, and popular is 'dummy coding' in which the estimates represent deviations from a preselected 'reference category'. A way to avoid choosing a reference category is effect coding, where the resulting estimates are deviations from a grand (unweighted) mean. An alternative for effect coding was given by Sweeney and Ulveling in 1972, which provides estimates representing deviations from the sample mean and is especially useful when the data are unbalanced (i.e., categories holding different numbers of observation). Despite its elegancy, this weighted effect coding has been cited only 35 times in the past 40 years, according to Google Scholar citations (more recent references include Hirschberg and Lye 2001 and Gober and Freeman 2005). Furthermore, it did not become a standard option in statistical packages such as SPSS and R. The aim of this paper is to revive weighted effect coding illustrated by recent research on the body mass index (BMI) and to provide easy-to-use syntax for SPSS, R, and Stata on http://www.ru.nl/sociology/mt/wec/downloads. For didactical reasons we apply OLS regression models, but it will be shown that weighted effect coding can be used in any generalized linear model. 5 p.

Contains fulltext : 139799.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) Contains fulltext : 139799-1.pdf (Author’s version preprint ) (Open Access) This article explores an important property of the intrinsic estimator that has received no attention in literature: the age, period, and cohort estimates of the intrinsic estimator are not unique but vary with the parameterization and reference categories chosen for these variables. We give a formal proof of the non-uniqueness property for effect coding and dummy variable coding. Using data on female mortality in the United States over the years 1960-1999, we show that the variation in the results obtained for different parameterizations and reference categories is substantial and leads to contradictory conclusions. We conclude that the non-uniqueness property is a new argument for not routinely applying the intrinsic estimator. 13 p.

Contains fulltext : 177657.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) A large proportion of adolescents eats too many energy-dense snacks, which is detrimental for their current and future health. To understand how to promote healthy dietary behaviors in adolescents, we need to identify factors that affect their snacking. While previous cross-sectional work has shown mother-child similarities in eating behavior, longitudinal studies are lacking. Hence, the first aim of this study was to examine whether maternal snacking predicted changes in adolescents' snacking over time. A second aim was to examine whether adolescents' television viewing magnified the strength of this longitudinal association. Television viewing may increase the motivation to eat the snacks consumed by mothers later on, for example through food advertisement exposure and mindless eating. To address both aims, 2051 adolescents (Mage baseline = 13.81; 51.5% boys) were asked to report on their snacking and television viewing three times, with intervals of one year. Moreover, a subsample of mothers of adolescents (N = 1080) reported on their snacking at baseline as well. The results indicate that maternal snacking indeed predicts adolescents' snacking over time and that this effect is more pronounced among adolescents who watch a great amount of television. These findings attest to the importance of mothers in forming adolescents' snacking, not only concurrently but also prospectively. Additionally, this study highlights the relevance of assessing other home environmental factors that may influence maternal effects on their children's snacking. 6 p.

Contains fulltext : 189806.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) This study investigates whether the decreased trust in news media can be explained by the increase in sensationalism in news. To this end, an experiment was conducted in which viewers (N = 288) evaluated sensationalist versus non-sensationalist television news in terms of perceived news quality and perceived sensationalism. Each participant watched four television news stories that varied in the presence of two categories of sensationalism: arousing content and tabloid packaging. Findings showed that sensationalist television news tends to be more negatively evaluated than non-sensationalist news. In addition, critical views on arousing content appeared to be particularly visible among young and middle-aged adults. These findings suggest that the rise of sensationalist news could be an explanation of the declining trust in news media that is witnessed in a number of countries. 12 p.

Sweeney and Ulveling (1972) introduced weighted effect coding, where the estimates for categories of nominal and ordinal variables are deviations from the arithmetic mean, typically from a sample. This somewhat neglected parameterization is preferred over the well-known effect coding (ANOVA) if the data are unbalanced (i.e., when categories hold different numbers of observations) and was recently revived in this journal (te Grotenhuis et al. 2016). In this paper, we show that weighted effect coding can also be applied to regression models with interaction effects. The weighted effect coded interactions represent the additional effects over and above the main effects obtained from the model without these interactions. This is a useful alternative to effect coding when the data are unbalanced as in most observational data. In this contribution, we describe this novel parameterization and provide syntax, data, and examples in SPSS, R, and Stata on http://www.ru.nl/sociology/mt/wec/downloads. For didactical reasons we apply OLS regression models, but weighted effect coded interactions can be used in any generalized linear model. Throughout this text we use the word ‘interaction’, while other researchers prefer ‘moderation’. Interactions between categorical variables Dummy coded interaction When directional interaction hypotheses are tested and categorical (i.e., ordinal or nominal scaled) predictor variables are involved, dummy coding is often appropriate. In this parameterization the main effects relate to a particular subset of respondents and for the remaining subsets the dummy coded interaction effects reflect deviations from these main effects. To create dummy coded interaction variables one has to multiply the original, 0/1 coded, dummy variables (Hardy 1993). As an empirical example we will investigate to what extent the mean BMI differs across three age categories in a group of respondents with one or more children and in a childless group (Umberson et al. 2011). We use data on self-reported body length and weight, in three random samples (n = 3314) drawn from the Dutch population (aged 18–70) in 2000, 2005, and 2011 (Eisinga et al. 2002, 2012a, b). We created the dummy coded variables Childlessdc with code 1 for respondents with no children and code 0 for respondents with one or more children, Middledc (code 1 for the middle-aged and 0 for both young and older respondents) and Olderdc (1 for older and 0 for both young and middle-aged respondents). The dummy coded interaction variables Childlessdc × Middledc, and Childlessdc × Olderdc are multiplications of these dummy coded variables (see Table 1 and our website for details). First, we estimated the main effects without interaction (see Table 4, Model 1) and second, we added the two interaction variables (Table 4, Model 2). Note that the reference categories (a) respondents with children, (b) youngsters, and (c) childless youngsters are omitted from the two models, which means that their estimates are set to zero. Table 1 Coding scheme for the dummy coded main and interaction effects for the childless, middle-aged and older-aged (references/omitted categories are with children, young, and childless × young)

Contains fulltext : 175928.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) This study investigates whether including sensationalist features in news stories is an appropriate strategy for news organizations to both attract and inform young adults. An experiment was conducted to examine whether content (negative versus neutral) and packaging (tabloid versus non-tabloid) of television news stories influenced preferences for and recognition of these stories among young viewers (16-21 years old), varying in educational level. Results showed that the use of sensationalist news features might indeed help news producers to attract young viewers to news. However, this holds for content but not for packaging. In addition, negative content improved recognition, but only among higher educated young viewers. 10 p.

Motivation: The Rank Product (RP) is a statistical technique widely used to detect differentially expressed features in molecular profiling experiments such as transcriptomics, metabolomics and proteomics studies. An implementation of the RP and the closely related Rank Sum (RS) statistics has been available in the RankProd Bioconductor package for several years. However, several recent advances in the understanding of the statistical foundations of the method have made a complete refactoring of the existing package desirable. Results: We implemented a completely refactored version of the RankProd package, which provides a more principled implementation of the statistics for unpaired datasets. Moreover, the permutation-based P-value estimation methods have been replaced by exact methods, providing faster and more accurate results. Availability and implementation: RankProd 2.0 is available at Bioconductor (https://www.bioconductor.org/packages/devel/bioc/html/RankProd.html) and as part of the mzMatch pipeline (http://www.mzmatch.sourceforge.net). Contact: rainer.breitling@manchester.ac.uk Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Contains fulltext : 162309.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) With the feminization (in numbers) of several professions, changing gender role prescriptions regarding parenthood and an increased attention for work-life balance, career theorists recently addressed the need for a more contemporary career model taking a work-home perspective. In this study, we test such a model by investigating how parenthood, and support for work-life balance and career progress at work affect both Dutch men and women medical specialists' career motivation and working (over)time. We are also interested in the mediating role of career motivation, and how these relationships differed between men and women. Contrary to what was expected, for women specialists parenthood had no total effect on their working (over)time, but support for work-life balance and high levels of career identity were importantly and positively related to working time, including overtime. For men specialists, however, only career identity showed relevance, and only regarding their contracted hours – not their overtime. Moreover, none of the family or work culture related issues seemed to affect men specialists' career motivation. We conclude that a contemporary career model with a work-home perspective reveals that some of our role expectations, especially regarding women professionals, seem to be outdated. However, further investigation is needed to explain men specialists' (long) working hours. 25 p.

In this study we analyze daily data on television viewing in the Netherlands. We postulate hypotheses on supply and demand factors that could impact the amount of daily viewing time. Although the general assumption is that supply and demand often correlate, we see that for television this is only marginally the case. Especially diversity of program supply, often deemed very important in media markets, does not affect (positively or negatively) television viewing behavior. Most variation in television viewing can be attributed to habit and to regular events (e. g. weekends, Christmas) and to unexpected events (e. g. the 9/11 WTC attack). We also find that weather conditions interact with program types, so that, for example, in winter times people favor entertainment programs even more, suggesting that people use television for mood management.

Contains fulltext : 102910.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) Anatomical professionals know better than anyone else that donated bodies are a valuable asset to anatomical science and medical education. They highly value voluntary donations, since a dearth of bodies negatively affects their profession. With this in mind, we conducted a survey (n ¼ 54) at the 171st scientific meeting of the Dutch Anatomical Society in 2009 to see to what extent anatomical professionals are willing to donate their own body. The results reveal that none of the survey participants are registered as a whole body donor and that only a quarter of them would consider the possibility of body donation. We argue that the two main constraints preventing Dutch anatomical professionals from donating their own body are their professional and their social environments. In contrast to the absence of registered body donors, half of the anatomical professionals are registered as an organ donor. This figure far exceeds the proportion of registered organ donors among the general Dutch population. 8 p.

Contains fulltext : 99877.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) This study examines the impact of daily atmospheric weather conditions on daily television use in the Netherlands for the period 1996–2005. The effects of the weather parameters are considered in the context of mood and mood management theory. It is proposed that inclement and uncomfortable weather conditions are associated with lower human mood, and that watching entertainment and avoiding informational programs may serve to repair such mood. We consequently hypothesize that people spend more time watching television if inclement and uncomfortable weather conditions (low temperatures, little sunshine, much precipitation, high wind velocity, less daylight) coincide with more airtime for entertainment programs, but that they view less if the same weather conditions coincide with more airtime devoted to information fare. We put this interaction thesis to a test using a time series analysis of daily television viewing data of the Dutch audience obtained from telemeters (T = 3,653), merged with meteorological weather station statistics and program broadcast figures, whilst controlling for a wide array of recurrent and one-time societal events. The results provide substantial support for the proposed interaction of program airtime and the weather parameters temperature and sunshine on aggregate television viewing time. Implications of the findings are discussed.

Contains fulltext : 99794.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) This article considers the effect of the interviewer's relative body weight, as measured by the body mass index (BMI), on interviewees’ responses to questions on restrictive eating behaviors, such as skipping meals and fasting. Survey methodologists have devoted much effort to determine the extent to which interviewee responses are affected by personal characteristics of the interviewer. Various studies have found that readily visible interviewer traits such as race (Hill, 2002) and gender (Flores-Macias & Lawson, 2008) may influence survey responses. The effects are particularly operant when respondents are queried about racial attitudes (Anderson, Silver, & Abramson, 1988), gender roles (Kane & Macaulay, 1993), and sensitive topics such as substance use (Dotinga, Van den Eijnden, Bosveld, & Garretsen, 2005; Lord, Friday & Brennan, 2005), sexual behavior and abuse (Chun, Tavarez, Dann, & Anastario, 2011). While the impact of interviewer race and gender has been widely explored, a virtually unstudied characteristic in interviewer research is the interviewer's BMI and the effect it may have on answers to survey questions. Sperry, Thompson, Roehrig, and Vandello (2005) examined whether communicator body weight affects responses to a body dissatisfaction intervention program 14 p.

Conditional inference on 2 x 2 tables with fixed margins and unequal probabilities is based on the extended hypergeometric distribution. If the support of the distribution is large, exact calculation of the conditional mean and variance of the table entry may be computationally demanding. This paper proposes a single-saddlepoint approximation to the mean and variance. While the approximation achieves acceptable accuracy for ordinary practical purposes, an alternative saddlepoint approximation is provided that gives much closer to exact results. It improves the accuracy of current approximations to up to more than four powers of ten.

Contains fulltext : 76722.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) This article examines whether intergenerational transmission of party preference is biased by retrospective and other-report measurement of family background characteristics [In our model the dependent variable is voting preference, while one of our explanatory variables is father's party preference. Therefore we speak of the intergenerational transmission of party preference.]. In addition the consequences of measurement error for the effects of father's church membership, his church attendance, whether he is self-employed, educational attainment, church membership, church attendance, whether the respondent is self-employed, and occupational status on voting preference are investigated. It turns out that the effects of educational attainment and father's party preference when the respondent was 15 years old on voting preference are underestimated if measurement error is not taken into account. The role of correlated error is negligible. As the effect of father's party preference is substantial and becomes even stronger after correcting for measurement error, it is advisable to include it in the model, while imputing information on measurement error. 14 p.

Contains fulltext : 56275.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) We formulate likelihood-based ecological inference for 2 × 2 tables with missing cell counts as an incomplete data problem and study Fisher information loss by comparing estimation from complete and incomplete data. In so doing, we consider maximum-likelihood (ML) estimators of probabilities governed by two independent binomial distributions and obtain simplified expressions for their covariance. These expressions reflect well the additional uncertainty arising from the unobserved data compared to complete data tables. We also discuss an approximation to the expected conditional variance of the unobserved entries and ML parameter bias correction. An empirical example is used to demonstrate the results.

Contains fulltext : 73544.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) Societal developments have forced universities all over Europe to replace their 'professional' strategies, structures, and values by organizational characteristics that could be stereotyped as 'private sector' features. This trend is known as 'managerialism'. Since university employees generally stick to professional values, a conflict may emerge between professional employee values and managerial organization values. This conflict can result in lower organizational commitment and, consequently, lower quality of job performances. Since managerialism is, however, aimed at efficient and effective quality improvement, this situation is what we regard as a managerialism contradiction. Affecting university employees' performances may solve or reduce such a contradiction. Since levels of managerialism differ among countries, this paper examines which factors affect the quality of job performances of 1,700 university employees in low-, middle- and high-managerialism countries. The analyses reveal that there are large differences and some similarities between the countries regarding which human resource management (HRM) practices affect the quality of employees' job performances. Furthermore, it appears that there are clear differences among the countries regarding how the HRM practices affect the quality of their job performances. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed. 22 p.

Objective Women have been reported to use more emotion-regulation strategies than do men and to have more abilities to regulate their emotions in a different way. The aim of the present study was to examine gender differences in the relationships of alexithymia, negative mood, and the combination of alexithymia and negative mood with emotional eating in obese persons. Methods Four hundred thirteen obese individuals [343 females and 70 males, aged 18–60 years, mean=43.6 years, body mass index (BMI)=38.4±6.6 kg/m 2 ] completed self-report questionnaires, including the Symptom Checklist-90 (SCL-90) questionnaire, the Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire (DEBQ), and the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS). Results Hierarchical regression analysis showed a significant interaction between gender and alexithymia. More difficulty in identifying or describing feelings was specifically associated with more emotional eating in men. Conclusion These findings suggest that alexithymia is more strongly involved in emotional eating of obese men than women. This offers indications for designing gender-specific treatments for emotional eating among obese persons.

Contains fulltext : 45454.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) This paper examines which factors affect organizational commitment among Dutch university employees in two faculties with different academic identities (separatist versus hegemonist, Stiles, 2004 Stiles, D. 2004. Narcissus Revisited: The Values of Management Academics and their Role in Business School Strategies in the UK and Canada. British Journal of Management, 15(2): 157–75. [CrossRef], [Web of Science ®], [Google Scholar] ). The analyses of Web survey data reveal that in the separatist faculty decentralization, compensation, training/development, positional tenure and career mobility have significant effects. Age, organizational tenure, level of autonomy, working hours, social involvement and personal importance significantly affect the employees' organizational commitment in the hegemonist faculty. Participation, social interactions and job level are factors that are important in both faculties. The findings indicate that the set of factors affecting the organizational commitment of employees differs between the separatist and hegemonist faculties. The findings empirically support the argument that different configurations or ‘bundles’ of HRM practices (Delery and Doty, 1996 Delery, J.E. and Doty, D.H. 1996. Modes of Theorizing in Strategic Human Resource Management: Tests of Universalistic, Contingency, and Configurational Performance Predictions. Academy of Management Journal, 39(4): 802–35. [CrossRef], [Web of Science ®], [Google Scholar] ; Guest, 1997 Guest, D.E. 1997. Human Resource Management and Performance: A Review and Research Agenda. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 8(3): 263–76. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Google Scholar] ) are suited for organizations with different identities. Explanations for the observed relationships, implications and limitations of the study are discussed. 20 p.

This paper considers the implementation of a non-stationary, heterogeneous Markov model for the analysis of binary dependent variables in a time series of repeated cross-sectional (RCS) surveys. The model offers the opportunity to estimate entry and exit transition probabilities and to examine the effects of time-constant and time-varying covariates on the hazards. We show how maximum likelihood estimates of the parameters can be obtained by Fisher’s method-of-scoring and how to estimate both fixed and time-varying covariate effects. The model is exemplified with an analysis of the labor force participation decision of Dutch and West German women using ISSP (and other) data from 10 annual Dutch surveys conducted between 1987 and 1996 and 7 annual West German surveys conducted between 1988 and 1994. Some open problems concerning the application of the model are discussed.

Contains fulltext : 62084.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) This paper discusses some simple practical advantages of Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods in estimating entry and exit transition probabilities from repeated independent surveys. Simulated data are used to illustrate the usefulness of MCMC methods when the likelihood function has multiple local maxima. Actual data on the evaluation of an HIV prevention intervention program among drug users are used to demonstrate the advantage of using prior information to enhance parameter identification. The latter example also demonstrates an important strength of the MCMC approach, namely the ability to make inferences on arbitrary functions of model parameters.

This paper discusses a nonstationary, heterogeneous Markov model designed to estimate entry and exit transition probabilities at the micro level from a time series of independent cross-sectional samples with a binary outcome variable. The model has its origins in the work of Moffitt and shares features with standard statistical methods for ecological inference. We outline the methodological framework proposed by Moffitt and present several extensions of the model to increase its potential application in a wider array of research contexts. We also discuss the relationship with previous lines of related research in political science. The example illustration uses survey data on American presidential vote intentions from a five-wave panel study conducted by Patterson in 1976. We treat the panel data as independent cross sections and compare the estimates of the Markov model with both dynamic panel parameter estimates and the actual observations in the panel. The results suggest that the proposed model provides a useful framework for the analysis of transitions in repeated cross sections. Open problems requiring further study are discussed.

Contains fulltext : 126059.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) Women physicians are confronted with incompatible gendered role prescriptions, whereby the role of the ‘ideal’ mother contrasts sharply with that of the ‘ideal’ physician. This study introduces four goal frames that reflect how women physicians internalize these conflicting role prescriptions and investigates the relationship between women’s goal frames and their career motivation. It also examines the relationship between gender-equality arrangements – inspired by the same underlying ideals – and women physicians’ career motivation, and whether these arrangements moderate the relationship between goal frames and career motivation. Cross-sectional data on 1070 Dutch women physicians collected in 2008 indicate that women physicians with switching goal frames (i.e. those who want to live up to both ideals) are no less career-motivated than women with one dominant goal frame. However, gender-equality arrangements mainly seem to support women physicians who prioritize one role over the other. No evidence was found that gender-equality arrangements support those who try to combine conflicting role expectations. 30 p.

Background The rank product method is a powerful statistical technique for identifying differentially expressed molecules in replicated experiments. A critical issue in molecule selection is accurate calculation of the p-value of the rank product statistic to adequately address multiple testing. Both exact calculation and permutation and gamma approximations have been proposed to determine molecule-level significance. These current approaches have serious drawbacks as they are either computationally burdensome or provide inaccurate estimates in the tail of the p-value distribution. Results We derive strict lower and upper bounds to the exact p-value along with an accurate approximation that can be used to assess the significance of the rank product statistic in a computationally fast manner. The bounds and the proposed approximation are shown to provide far better accuracy over existing approximate methods in determining tail probabilities, with the slightly conservative upper bound protecting against false positives. We illustrate the proposed method in the context of a recently published analysis on transcriptomic profiling performed in blood. Conclusions We provide a method to determine upper bounds and accurate approximate p-values of the rank product statistic. The proposed algorithm provides an order of magnitude increase in throughput as compared with current approaches and offers the opportunity to explore new application domains with even larger multiple testing issue. The R code is published in one of the Additional files and is available at http://www.ru.nl/publish/pages/726696/rankprodbounds.zip. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12859-014-0367-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Contains fulltext : 134986.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) This paper considers the implementation of a nonstationary, heterogeneous Markov model for the analysis of a binary dependent variable in a time series of independent cross sections. The model, previously considered by Moffitt(1993), offers the opportunity to estimate entry and exit transition probabilities and to examine the effects of time-constant and time-varying covariates on the hazards. We show how ML estimates of the parameters can be obtained by Fisher's method-of-scoring and how to estimate both fixed and time-varying covariate effects. The model is exemplified with an analysis of the labor force participation decision of Dutch women using data from the Socio-economic Panel (SEP) study conducted in the Netherlands between 1986 and 1995. We treat the panel data as independent cross sections and compare the employment status sequences predicted by the model with the observed sequences in the panel. Some open problems concerning the application of the model are also discussed.

This paper is an empirical study to the effects of economic outcomes on party choice for the Netherlands. In the first part of the paper we employ a multinomial logit model to examine the links between voters' characteristics and party choice. The results suggest that there are long-run movements in party choice which are unlikely be the result of changing economic outcomes. In the second part, we use time series analysis to determine the effects of economic conditions on short-run and medium-run movements in votes shares. The estimations results provide support for the responsibility hypothesis and for the predictions of the partisan voter model that left-wing (right-wing) parties benefit (suffer) from favourable economic growth prospects.

A time series (t = 921) of weekly survey data on vote intentions in the Netherlands for the period 1978–1995 shows that the percentage of undecided voters follows a cyclical pattern over the election calendar. The otherwise substantial percentage of undecided voters decreases sharply in weeks leading up to an election and gradually increases afterwards. This article models the dynamics of this asymmetric electoral cycle using artificial neural networks, with the purpose of estimating when the undecided voters start making up their minds. We find that they begin to decide which party to vote for nine weeks before a first order national parliamentary election and one to four weeks before a second order election, depending on the type of election (European Parliament, Provincial States, City-councils). The effect of political campaigns and the implications for political analysis are discussed.

Rob Eisinga, Manfred te Grotenhuis, Ben Pelzer Department of Social Science Research Methods and Department of Sociology, Radboud University Nijmegen, PO Box 9104, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlands October 8 2012 To obtain reliable measures researchers prefer multiple-item questionnaires rather than single-item tests. Multiple-item questionnaires may be costly however and time-consuming for participants to complete. They therefore frequently administer two-item measures, the reliability of which is commonly assessed by computing a reliability coefficient. There is some disagreement, however, what the most appropriate indicator of scale reliability is when a measure is composed of two items. The most frequently reported reliability statistic for multiple-item scales is Cronbach’s coefficient alpha and many researchers report this coefficient for their two-item measure

This paper investigates convergence in left-right ideological positions in The Netherlands using cointegration techniques. Our sample consists of 765 weekly observations on those positions as well as on the corresponding political party preference. The time series data display nonstationary patterns in the sense that their means are not constant over time. Therefore, we rely on recently developed techniques in the analysis of multivariate nonstationary time series to study convergence. One of our results is that the ideological positions, when considered relative to a benchmark, can be described by trend-stationary processes. This means that we cannot reject the presence of convergence. Implications of this result are discussed.

Using data from 1098 national Dutch surveys, this paper explores trends in the influence of religious denomination on votes for confessional political parties in the Netherlands from 1964 to 1992. The broad question is whether confessional voting has declined over this 29‐year period; the narrow issue is whether the declines vary with religious denomination and time. Logit analysis of the overall effect allows a downward trend in the influence of denomination. The most spectacular decays occurred in the 1960s and 1970s, among Catholics and Rereformed Protestants. Many of the shifts slowed down appreciably in the late 1970s and subsequently abated in the mid‐1980s. Possible explanations for these findings are discussed.

The Glock and Stark theoretical framework on Christian beliefs and anti-Semitism implies that orthodox religious beliefs perpetuate secular anti-Semitism via particularism and religious anti-Semitism. Several critics have argued that the major weakness of this study is its failure to examine explanatory variables other than religious beliefs. This paper addresses these issues using data from a 1990-91 national Dutch survey. Although the results tend to support the assumption that nonreligious variables are far more important to the explanation of anti-Semitism and, too, that they attenuate the impact of Christian orthodoxy, the effects of the latter are by no means spurious. The most important conclusion of this paper is therefore that there still is, in Holland at least, a religious factor at work, albeit a modest one, generating anti-Semitic beliefs. Numerous studies have documented that people who consider themselves to be Christians are more likely to be anti-Semitic than those who are not religious. Despite the large amount of data that has been collected on this issue, however, the problem of whether and, if so, how and to what extent Christian religion per se engenders less compassion for Jews has never really been solved. Ambiguity remains because most studies have not been theory-guided, and consequently their findings were purely ad hoc. Further, in studying religion and its role in supporting anti-Semitism, one must always consider the possibility that nonreligious variables may create spurious patterns of relationships. Relatively little research has yet been done, however, to determine their confounding influences in order to support or challenge the assumption - held by many but made explicit by a few - that the Christian churches are conducive to anti-Jewish sentiments in their members. This paper examines the role orthodox Christian beliefs play in religious and secular anti-Semitism in the Netherlands, using data from a 1990-91 national Dutch survey. The study was triggered by the recent revival of hostility towards Jews across much of western Europe. Many of those who try to understand this upsurge emphasize anti-Semitic prejudice deeply entrenched within European Christian culture and history as the core of the problem. We therefore decided to examine whether vestiges of this legacy remain in Holland to

La relation entre appartenance religieuse et ethnocentrisme est complexe. Une premiere exploration des donnees d'une enquete (automne 1989) portant sur les attitudes des Flamands (Belgique) vis-a-vis des immigres, ne permet pas d'exclure un effet negatif de l'appartenance religieuse. Celui-ci est d'autant plus probable que l'on a affaire a des personnes de plus de 45 ans, developpant un sentiment d'impuissance sociale et s'averant etre des catholiques marginaux. Il en va de meme des non-catholiques de faible niveau scolaire. Le present papier se propose, a partir d'une perspective plus theorique, de limiter l'analyse de cette relation a la population catholique. Les donnees recueillies debut 1991 montrent que la foi chretienne ne donne pas une explication additionnelle. Des variables intermediaires comme l'impuissance sociale et la localisation culturelle et sociale, l'appartenance religieuse et l'affiliation aux associations volontaires ont un effet modere sur les differentes dimensions de l'ethnocentrisme. Il semble des lors que cette influence puisse etre attribuee aux valeurs humanistes du Christianisme socio-culturel

Contains fulltext : 102650pub.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) Objectives To determine the effect of interviewer BMI on self-reported restrained eating in a face-to-face survey and to examine under- and over-reporting using the face-to face study and a postal follow-up. Methods A sample of 1,212 Dutch adults was assigned to 98 interviewers with different BMI who administered an eating questionnaire. To further evaluate misreporting a mail follow-up was conducted among 504 participants. Data were analyzed using two-level hierarchical models. Results Interviewer BMI had a positive effect on restrained eating. Normal weight and pre-obese interviewers obtained valid responses, underweight interviewers stimulated underreporting whereas obese interviewers triggered overreporting. Conclusion In face-to-face interviews self-reported dietary restraint is distorted by interviewer BMI. This result has implications for public health surveys, the more so given the expanding obesity epidemic. 5 p.

In this article we raise the research question to what extent the declining number of church members and the changing voting behavior among church members and non-members explain the longitudinal trend in voter turnout of the largest Christian political party in the Netherlands, the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA). In a counterfactual analysis we simulated no disaffiliation since 1970 and found a more or less constant loss of 9 seats in the Dutch House of Representatives throughout the whole period. Next, we simulated no change in voting behavior of both church members and nonmembers since 1970 and this resulted in a substantial loss of 10 to 14 seats, concentrated in 1994- 2010. We also estimated the contribution of church members’ and non-members’ voting behavior separately. It turned out that until 1994 the effects were opposite to each other. As a result the net effect of voting behavior was close to zero for a long time. This changed dramatically from the 1994 elections onwards as many church members did not vote for the CDA anymore and tipped the balance. This was especially so in the 2010 elections, where the CDA faced unprecedented losses.

Contains fulltext : 101266.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) In the Netherlands, the number of body donor registrations has been increasing for several years. Body donors are people who register at an anatomical institute to donate their entire body, after death, for scientific education and research. Although only 0.1% of the Dutch population is registered as a body donor, this is sufficient to realize the anatomical demand of about 650 bodies annually. Due to the recent rise of registrations many anatomical institutes have (temporarily) stopped registering new donors to prevent a surplus of bodies. Based on a large body donor survey (n = 759) and in-depth anthropological interviews with 20 body donors, we try to give an explanation for the rising registration numbers. We argue that the choice for body donation in contemporary, individualized Dutch society is an autonomous way to give meaning and sense to life and death outside the framework of institutionalized religion.

Contains fulltext : 102892pub.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) Expressive suppression is regarded as a generally ineffective emotion regulation strategy and appears to be associated with the development of depressive symptoms among adolescents. However, the mechanisms linking suppression to depressive symptoms are not well understood. The main aim of this study was to examine two potential mediators of the prospective relationship from depressive symptoms to expressive suppression among adolescents: parental support and peer victimization. Structural equation modelling was used to construct a three-wave cross-lagged model (n = 2,051 adolescents, 48.5 % female, at baseline; 1,465 with data at all three time points) with all possible longitudinal linkages. Depressive symptoms preceded decreases in perceived parental support 1 year later. Decreases in parental support mediated the relationship between depressive symptoms and increases in expressive suppression over a 2-year period. Multi-group analyses show that the mediation model tested was significant for girls, but not for boys. No evidence for other mediating models was found. Although initial suppression preceded increases in depressive symptoms 1 year later, we did not find any evidence for the reversed link from suppression to depressive symptoms. Clear evidence for a reciprocal relationship between depressive symptoms and parental support was found. However, only limited and inconsistent support was found for a reciprocal relationship between depressive symptoms and peer victimization. Finally, although some evidence for a unidirectional relationship from parental support to increases in suppression was found, no significant prospective relationship was found between peer victimization and suppression. The implications of our clear results for parental support, and mostly lacking results for peer victimization, are discussed.

Contains fulltext : 103081.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) Inclement weather on election day is widely seen to benefit certain political parties at the expense of others. Empirical evidence for this weather-vote share hypothesis is sparse however. We examine the effects of rainfall and temperature on share of the votes of eight political parties that participated in 13 national parliament elections, held in the Netherlands from 1971 to 2010. This paper merges the election results for all Dutch municipalities with election-day weather observations drawn from all official weather stations well distributed over the country. We find that the weather parameters affect the election results in a statistically and politically significant way. Whereas the Christian Democratic party benefits from substantial rain (10 mm) on voting day by gaining one extra seat in the 150-seat Dutch national parliament, the left-wing Social Democratic (Labor) and the Socialist parties are found to suffer from cold and wet conditions. Cold (5°C) and rainy (10 mm) election day weather causes the latter parties to lose one or two parliamentary seats. 5 p.

Contains fulltext : 99678.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) Sixty years ago the late William S. Robinson (1913-96) published his Ecological Correlations and the Behaviors of Individuals. 1. The paper became an all-time classic and it is one of the most influential methodological papers in social sciences. To underscore its impact on epidemiology, this classic was reprinted in this journal, 2. along with an original re-analysis of Robinson's data and conclusion from a multilevel and historical perspective, 3. with discussions. 4-7. In this research letter, we identify, and correct, an error in Robinson's original analysis. 3 p.

Contains fulltext : 99595.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) Background: This study examines the relationship between motivation for body donation to science and personality characteristics using a body donor survey (N = 759) conducted by the University Medical Centre Groningen (UMCG) in The Netherlands. The survey expands on anthropological studies that suggest an association between donor motivation and personality. Methods: A structural equation model was used to investigate the relationship between personality and motivation for body donation. Findings: The results show that, compared to society at large, body donors have a similar spectrum of personality characteristics. However, we found statistically significant positive relationships between donor motivation and Big Five personality traits. Together the personality traits explain between 5% and 15% of the variance in motivation for body donation. Conclusions: We argue that donor campaigns should not focus solely on altruistic motives, but should include the aspect of possible personal achievement by the donor. This is a fruitful starting point for approaching potential donors and anticipating their needs. 6 p.

Contains fulltext : 99604.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) The key question in research on dismissals of head coaches in sports clubs is not whether they should happen but when they will happen. This paper applies piecewise linear regression to advance our understanding of the timing of head coach dismissals. Essentially, the regression sacrifices degrees of freedom for increased possibilities of interpretation. In the empirical part, we show that badly performing clubs tend to wait for clear evidence before dismissing a head coach. Dutch soccer clubs only dismiss head coaches during the soccer season when a club loses a match it should not have. We also find that once the decision to dismiss the incumbent head coach has been made, clubs quickly tend to appoint a new one, possibly by attracting an interim coach.