Contradictory Empirical Results Research Articles

Toward an Integrative Theory of Psychological Defense

According to theories of “psychological defense,” humans are motivated to protect themselves against various types of psychological threat, including death awareness, uncertainty, and other inherently anxiety-provoking experiences. Protective mechanisms include strengthening close relationships; maintaining appraisals of self-worth, accomplishment, and agency; and cultivating meaningful views of the world. Thus, defensiveness theories incorporate research from many areas of psychology (e.g., information-processing biases, attitudes, and interpersonal and intergroup relations), to help explain why people think, feel, and act in the diverse ways that they do. Currently, the study of psychological defense is hindered by contradictory empirical results and a proliferation of theories that make very similar predictions. This article examines a cross-section of defensiveness theories and research, highlighting conclusions that can be drawn and areas where conceptual and research problems linger. It suggests that the field needs methodological innovation (e.g., more reliable and valid manipulations and measures of unconscious constructs, more diverse methodological approaches), a more complete and reliable body of data, and some fresh new ideas from psychological scientists across disciplines.

Banking Competition and Stability: The Role of Leverage

This paper reexamines the classical issue of the possible trade-o s between banking competition and financial stability by highlighting di erent types of risk and the role of leverage. By means of a simple model we show that competition can a ect portfolio risk, insolvency risk, liquidity risk, and systemic risk di erently. The e ect depends crucially on banks’ liability structure, on whether banks are financed by insured retail deposits or by uninsured wholesale debts, and on whether the indebtness is exogenous or endogenous. In particular we suggest that, while in a classical originate-to-hold banking industry competition might increase financial stability, the opposite can be true for an originate-to-distribute banking industry of a larger fraction of market short-term funding. This leads us to revisit the existing empirical literature using a more precise classification of risk. Our theoretical model therefore helps to clarify a number of apparently contradictory empirical results and proposes new ways to analyze the impact of banking competition on financial stability.

Modeling of tumor growth in dendritic cell-based immunotherapy using artificial neural networks

Exposure-response modeling and simulation is especially useful in oncology as it permits to predict and design un-experimented clinical trials as well as dose selection. Dendritic cells (DC) are the most effective immune cells in the regulation of immune system. To activate immune system, DCs may be matured by many factors like bacterial CpG-DNA, Lipopolysaccharaide (LPS) and other microbial products.In this paper, a model based on artificial neural network (ANN) is presented for analyzing the dynamics of antitumor vaccines using empirical data obtained from the experimentations of different groups of mice treated with DCs matured by bacterial CpG-DNA, LPS and whole lysate of a Gram-positive bacteria Listeria monocytogenes. Also, tumor lysate was added to DCs followed by addition of maturation factors. Simulations show that the proposed model can interpret the important features of empirical data. Owing to the nonlinearity properties, the proposed ANN model has been able not only to describe the contradictory empirical results, but also to predict new vaccination patterns for controlling the tumor growth. For example, the proposed model predicts an exponentially increasing pattern of CpG-matured DC to be effective in suppressing the tumor growth.

Does fragmentation increase extinction thresholds? A European‐wide test with seven forest birds

AbstractAimTheory predicts that fragmentation aggravates habitat loss, increasing the extinction threshold of habitat specialists. However, contradictory empirical results have fuelled claims that fragmentation has been overemphasized, and more attention should be given to habitat loss for preserving species. We assess variation in species sensitivity to forest amount and fragmentation and evaluate if fragmentation is related to extinction thresholds in seven forest bird species.LocationEurope.MethodsWe use the percentage of forest cover and the proportion of cover occurring in the largest patch to partition effects of forest amount versus fragmentation, and apply logistic regression to model the presence–absence of 17 forest bird species. For seven species showing robust models, we define two fragmentation scenarios, low and maximum, across the forest cover gradient and quantify species' sensitivity to forest contraction with no fragmentation, and to fragmentation under constant forest cover. Finally, we develop two tests of the extinction threshold hypothesis by comparing the occurrence probability of each species under the two fragmentation scenarios at different forest covers.ResultsAs expected, forest contraction had negative impacts on the occurrence probability of all seven species modelled, but – in line with theory – fragmentation also led to a higher extinction threshold for three (Western capercaillie, Hazel grouse and Eurasian pygmy‐owl). One species (Black woodpecker) exhibited the opposite pattern indicating that it probably benefits from fragmentation. Differences among species responses may reflect dispersal abilities, specializations in resources/habitat characteristics and/or sensitivity to potential modifications of interspecific interactions.Main conclusionsAlthough forest amount is of primary importance for the persistence of forest specialist birds, fragmentation is also relevant for some, and neglecting forest fragmentation would be a mistake for these species. Species‐specific traits can be helpful for interpreting species' reactions to fragmentation, and it should not be assumed that it always, or never, matters.

The Limits of Diversion: Rethinking Internal and External Conflict

The diversionary hypothesis offers a powerful alternative to rationalist explanations of war based on the state as a unitary actor. Most recently, it has been used to explain why democratizing states are more likely to initiate the use of force. In the past two decades, however, quantitative tests have produced mixed and often contradictory empirical results regarding the relationship between domestic unrest and external conflict. This article uses a modified “most likely” case study research design to test the hypothesis. Examination of Argentina's seizure of the Falkland Islands and Turkey's invasion of Cyprus, two cases that should be easy for diversion to explain, provide surprisingly little empirical support for the hypothesis, raising doubts about its wider validity as well as the relationship between democratization and war.

General alliance experience, uncertainty, and marketing alliance governance mode choice

Drawing from transaction cost economics (TCE), the knowledge-based view (KBV), and real options theory (ROT), we propose that the general alliance experience of alliance partner firms moderates the impact of market uncertainty and alliance-specific uncertainty on the benefits and costs of the two marketing alliance governance modes, i.e., non-equity alliances and joint ventures. Based on our systematic study of 18,616 marketing alliances occurring in 48 industries across 164 countries between 1992 and 2008, we find general alliance experience significantly moderates firms’ marketing alliance governance mode choices. Our framework reconciles some contradictory empirical results in the interfirm relationship governance structure literature by emphasizing the moderating role of partner firms’ general alliance experience. Specifically, when alliances can be characterized has having a large cultural distance between the partners or having a market with a broad geographic scope, it seems that TCE predictions regarding the marketing alliance governance mode choice hold for inexperienced firms while KBV and ROT predictions hold for experienced firms. In addition, by incorporating key aspects of all three theories, our proposed framework has the potential to provide deeper insights into the role of alliance experience and uncertainty in firms’ marketing alliance governance mode choices.

An alternative interpretation of ‘average years of education’ in growth regressions

The majority of the empirical literature uses average years of education as a proxy of the human capital stock. Based on Lucas (1988) we argue that the level of average years of education can also be seen as a proxy for the growth rate of the per capita human capital stock. This has fundamental impact on the interpretation of the coefficient and may explain some of the contradictory empirical results.

The Quality of Public Investment

This paper develops a growth model with specialized goods where inefficient and corrupt bureaucracies interact with the provision of public investment services in affecting the productivity of private capital, specialization, and growth. The model provides potential explanations for the contradictory empirical results on the effects of public investment found in the literature as well as for the role of the quality of public infrastructure investment in creating a gap between rich and poor countries. From a policy perspective, the paper suggests that the link between public investment and growth depends critically on the quality and efficiency of public capital.

Why Do Firms Invest Abroad? An Analysis of the Motives Underlying Foreign Direct Investments

Although FDI have been at the forefront of economic debate since a long time, economists have not yet developed a unified framework for their investigation. In this paper, we put forward the idea that an essential point to analyze FDI concerns their underpinning motives. Motives are at the core of FDI and FDI are only but one of different alternative means for firms to grasp an opportunity in a foreign country. We discuss the factors that shape the set of available alternatives and analyze those affecting the decision to engage in FDI (internalisation determinants), along with those influencing their localisation (localisation determinants). Starting from Dunning (1993) we put forward a revised taxonomy of FDI motives consistent with this framework - resource seeking, market seeking and non-marketable asset seeking. In order to show its practical implications, we survey common empirical issues on FDI showing how our analysis can shed light on seemingly contradictory empirical results.

Technical uncertainty in the back‐calculation of occupational exposure to dioxins

Members of a cohort of workers in chemical industry (the so-called Boehringer cohort) exposed to 2, 3, 7, 8-tetrachlorodibenzo-para-dioxin (TCDD) from 1950 to 1984 were subject in the years 1985-1986 and 1992-1994 to an extensive biomonitoring programme on the TCDD levels of the individual workers. For establishing a dose-response relationship between TCDD-exposure and potentially carcinogenic response, the individual TCDD concentration-time courses had to be back-calculated over a period of up to more than four decades. Two back-calculations were attempted for this sophisticated modelling and estimation task, both based on the same toxicokinetic model but yielding different results. We demonstrate here by means of a computer simulation study that these differences could be plausibly explained by the so-called technical uncertainty caused by the employment of differently statistical estimation techniques. We show that the estimation techniques perform particularly differently in the presence of workplace misclassification and TCDD measurement error, two complications of exposure assessment that are with high probability affecting concurrently that cohort's data. We conclude that technical uncertainty sensibly enlarges the pool of possible explanations for contradictory empirical results of complex modelling and estimation approaches and should be considered as an obligatory uncertainty analysis step after the primary risk analysis evaluation in epidemiological and environmental studies.

DOES THE STOCK MARKET ACT AS A SIGNAL FOR REAL ACTIVITY? EVIDENCE FROM AUSTRALIA

Binswanger (2000) concluded that traditional links between stock market performance and two major macroeconomic indicators, production and GDP, broke down in the most recent US bull market. Australia's stock market also took off in the early 1980s and the objective of the present paper is to contribute to the literature on the connection between the stock market and real economic activity, using Australian data. The study finds that, unlike the US, the links between stock prices and industrial production or GDP remained strong during the high‐growth phase in Australia. However, this relationship breaks down in periods of slower economic growth with contradictory empirical results for different macroeconomic indicators. The paper concludes that increasing globalisation is the most plausible explanation for this phenomenon.

A triangulation analysis of value congruency in corporate Spain: American dream or Spanish reality?

The construct of value congruency has become the centre of scholarly as well as practitioner attention in the past two decades. Theoretical reasoning, however, has mainly originated in an Anglo Saxon context accompanied by scarce and contradictory empirical results. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to explore further the construct and determine its presence in the relatively unexplored cultural context of Spanish organizations. A novel triangulation measure is proposed and values are assessed by three independent data sources, representing three different constituencies in the company: non-management employees, HR directors, and a blend of senior management and communication directors inferred by the corporate websites of the firms studied. The latter is a relatively new medium for companies to shape and instil values, and is assessed by means of content analysis. Results show that value congruency is rather rare for the organizations of the sample studied and discussion revolves around issues of culture, possible clashes between values and the respective impact on the hypothesized sequence: values–satisfaction–performance. It is proposed that it may be more relevant in subsequent research to focus on incongruencies or ambiguities.

Family ties, interlocking directors and performance of business groups in emerging countries: The case of Chile

The effect of business groups on economic performance is controversial, both theoretically and empirically. We hypothesized that the seemingly contradictory empirical results can be explained by the differentiated governance structure of the business groups and, in particular, the role of social ties (family ties and interlocking directorates). Using a sample of Chilean firms, we analyzed the effects of social ties on the economic performance of firms affiliated to business groups. Our results support the hypothesis that the ownership-control structure (i.e., economic rights and voting rights) affects performance both directly and in interaction with social ties. Social ties improve performance when the concentration of voting rights is low, and when the voting rights of the controlling shareholders are aligned with their economic rights.

Are Market Orientation and Learning Orientation Necessary for Superior Organizational Performance

There exists contradictory theoretical arguments and counter-intuitive empirical results regarding the market orientation, learning orientation and organizational performance nexus. We ask, can we simplify relations in this nexus? This study analyzes data from Australian organisations and employs non-nested encompassing tests. Contrary to recent findings extolling the virtues of a learning orientation, our results suggest that a market orientation may be the pre-eminent strategy to achieve superior organizational performance.

Health care is an individual necessity and a national luxury: applying multilevel decision models to the analysis of health care expenditures

Health care is neither “a necessity” or “a luxury”; it is “both” since the income elasticity varies with the level of analysis. With insurance, individual income elasticities are typically near zero, while national health expenditure elasticities are commonly greater than 1.0. The debate over whether health care is or is not a luxury good arises primarily from the failure to specify levels of analysis clearly so as to distinguish variation within groups from variation between groups. Apparently, contradictory empirical results are shown to be consistent with a simple nested multilevel model of health care spending.

Wage Posting in Two‐Sided Search and the Minimum Wage

This article focuses on wage formation in an equilibrium (two‐sided) model of search with match‐specific heterogeneity. Despite a large number (a continuum) of employers, search provides sufficient isolation to generate market power. By posting wages, employers, without collusion, capture most of the surplus that accrues to any match. The equilibrium wage is below that which maximizes employment. An example, using calibrated parameter values, is used to reconcile some recent, otherwise contradictory empirical results on the employment effects of minimum wage adjustments.

Consumer racial discrimination: A reassessment of the market for baseball cards

Research on the presence of consumer racial discrimination in the baseball labor and memorabilia markets has produced contradictory empirical results. While studies of baseball salaries find no evidence of discrimination, Nardinelli and Simon (1990) and Andersen and La Croix (1991) use data from the baseball card market to show that the price that consumers pay for a card depends on the player’s race. In this paper, we reconsider the evidence of consumer discrimination in the baseball card market. Our study improves on previous research by applying more appropriate econometric methods and using a data set in which card supply is constant and incentives for speculative demand are weaker. In contradiction to the aforementioned studies, we find little evidence of racial discrimination. This result proves robust across variable specifications and econometric models.

A Reconciliation of Some Paradoxical Empirical Results on the Expectations Model of the Term Structure

In this paper we attempt to reconcile contradictory empirical results for the expectations model of the term structure which are found when it is tested by a variety of methods based on single‐equation and VAR models. Using monthly data for one‐month and three‐month interest rates, we show that the expectations hypothesis is rejected for the US and UK term structures on the basis of some popular tests. However, tests based on VAR models or on IV regressions of yield spreads on future short rate changes provide no evidence against the expectations model with a random component in the term premium.

A Comparison of Real Estate Marketing Systems: Theory and Evidence

The objective of this paper is twofold. One is to provide a search-theoretical model of the marketing choice of the seller. The model explains the seemingly contradictory empirical results as to wh...

The Act Frequency Approach to the study of impulsivity

Though widely used in research on personality, the impulsivity construct is far from being well defined. Different ways of measuring and operationalizing this construct have led to contradictory empirical results. Nor is it clear where impulsivity belongs in multidimensional personality models. For instance, in Eysenck's original scheme it is treated as a component of extroversion, whereas in Costa and McCrae's (1992) NEO model it is a facet of the neuroticism dimension. In this study, we used Buss and Craik's Act Frequency Approach to investigate the components of impulsivity and its relationships (at both internal and manifested structure levels) with extroversion and neuroticism. A set of acts was identified, the frequency of commission of which correlated with other measures of impulsivity (especially its motor and cognitive aspects), and correlated better with neuroticism than with extroversion.