Informal Rule Research Articles

DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF TRIALS WITH QUALITY OF LIFE AS AN OUTCOME: A PRACTICAL GUIDE

Health Related Quality of Life (HRQoL) measures are becoming more frequently used in clinical trials, as both primary and secondary endpoints. Investigators are now asking statisticians for advice on how to plan (e.g., sample size) and analyze studies using HRQoL measures. HRQoL measures such as the SF-36 are usually measured on an ordered categorical (ordinal) scale. In the designing stages and when analyzing, the scales are often scored and the scores treated as if they were continuous and normally distributed. However the ordinal scaling of HRQoL measures leads to problems in determining sample size, and conventional parametric methods of estimation and hypothesis testing may not be appropriate for such outcomes. We present practical guidelines for the design and analysis of trials with HRQoL measures as outcomes. We used conventional statistical methods (i.e., t-tests and multiple regression), various ordinal regression models (proportional odds, continuation ratio, polytomous and stereotype) and bootstrap methods to analyze an HRQoL dataset. To illustrate the various methods we used HRQoL data on the SF-36 Role Limitations Emotional dimension for two groups of patients with leg ulcers. The bootstrap, t-test, and multiple regression methods gave similar results. The various ordinal regression models also gave similar results. If the HRQoL measure has a large number of ordered categories, most of which are occupied, and the underlying scale really is continuous but measured imperfectly by an instrument with a limited number of discrete values, then an informal rule of thumb is that this discrete scale should be treated as continuous if it has seven or more categories and as ordinal otherwise.

The Case for a New Fiscal Constitution

For the first 140 years of U.S. history, the federal budget was effectively constrained by two fiscal rules: the formal limits within the Constitution on the enumerated spending powers and an informal rule that the government could borrow only during recessions and wars. At the end of the 1920s, federal expenditures were 2.6 percent of GNP. The federal debt was constrained to about equal to 16 percent of GNP. The general price level was roughly stable over this long period. Over the past six decades, however, federal expenditures have increased to nearly 25 percent of GNP. Larger and more frequent budget deficits have increased the federal debt held by the public to an amount equal to about 50 percent of GNP. And the general price level is now about nine times the level at the beginning of this period. This dramatic change in fiscal and monetary conditions occurred without one amendment to the Constitution to authorize a change in the fiscal rules. Our effective fiscal constitution has been transformed into one in which Congress and the President may authorize any type or amount of expenditures and taxes, subject only to the voting rules for routine legislation. How did this happen? Should economists be concerned about this change in the fiscal constitution? What, if anything, should be done about it?

A Brief Survey of Law in Brazil

Using the anthropological method of legal pluralism, the author in this paper briefly surveys the development of law and legal institutions in Brazil. He shows how weak state legal organization in the Colonial period led to the development of private police forces and informal rule making, a pattern which continues to the present. Attempts in the last century to create a centralized Imperial state based on the development of a well trained judicial bureaucracy failed due to the power of the export oriented coffee aristocracy. The “First Republic” saw the creation of powerful state military police forces built to defend the interests of local oligarchies. These elite institutions continue as the formal legal system of the country, but are not adequate to the modern urban industrial society of today's Brazil. The development of new, more democratic, legal forms is essential.

Universalism and Allocative Decision Making in the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors

This paper focuses on an allocative norm of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors whereby certain nonmandated federal funds are divided equally among the five supervisorial districts. This norm is relatively notorious in L.A. as the "rule of five," but it is not generally realized, even in county government circles, that the board has formally voted to adopt the divide by five approach. Universalism in L.A. County is not simply an informal or unwritten rule; it is policy. This provides a unique opportunity to study an important and widely observed legislative phenomenon in the making. We reconstruct the legislative history of two instances in which the board voted to adopt a divide by five rule, and offer a theoretical model to explain these votes. The model is game-theoretic, viewing the situation as essentially a zero-sum game of divide the dollar. The model also explicitly considers risk aversion. In both these regards it differs from Weingast's and Fiorina's models of universalism in Congress.

Criteria for Evaluation of Organizational Communication Effectiveness: Review and Synthesis

This paper contains a discussion of 21 potential criteria for assessing the effectiveness of communication in organizations. The criteria are derived from a systematic, computer-based search of the literature in communication, management, organizational behavior, and allied fields. The criteria are grouped under the general heading of communication rules, since the formal and informal rule structure of the organization provides the framework within which individual criteria operate. Five categories of criteria are described: structure, messages, media, communicator, and potpourri. The media category is omitted for brevity purposes from the present paper.For each criterion, the major literature identified by the authors is summarized, and a discussion is given of the conditions under which the criterion can exemplify more or less effective communication. The set of criteria, while not exhaustive, offers a focus for a continuing attempt to transform the multifaceted notion of “communication effectiveness” into more operational terms that have both theoretic and practical utility. The paper concludes with a brief outline of the next steps involved in developing this initial effort—the derivation of propositions or assertions, operationalization and measurement, and research that will yield empirical evidence about the criteria (their reliability, validity, and value).