Long-term Payoff Research Articles

Decision making with the "adaptive toolbox": influence of environmental structure, intelligence, and working memory load.

In 2 experiments with a total of 220 participants, the tendency to use simple heuristics such as the take the best heuristic in an adaptive manner was investigated. In a simulated stock market paradigm, the payoff structure of environments was varied, favoring either compensatory or noncompensatory decision strategies in terms of expected long-term payoff. In both experiments, the majority of participants were classified as using strategies that were adequate for the environment, supporting the notion of adaptive strategy selection. These strategy shifts were moderated by intelligence, as measured with common tests. Neither an additional learning phase (Experiment 1) nor working memory load or working memory capacity (Experiment 2) had additional effects on strategy selection.

The Participation of Underrepresented Minorities in Clinical Research

The past decade witnessed unprecedented growth in medical research involving human subjects, promising the development of new treatments that extend and improve the quality of life, as well as prevent disease. Recent biomedical breakthroughs such as the mapping of the human genome, improved understanding of pharmacokinetics and molecular biology, and novel theories about the mechanisms of diseases such as cancer have led to a proliferation of clinical trials. Such research provides the necessary bridge from scientific theory to practical medical application, and it is essential that these efforts benefit all persons who suffer from the studied diseases.In addition to the potential long-term pay-offs, clinical trials may offer immediate dividends to enrolled subjects. The opportunity to participate in medical research carries with it a variety of potential risks and benefits. Because clinical trial participation potentially results in significant individual benefits, including access to state-of-the-art care and improved disease monitoring, fairness demands equal opportunity for inclusion whenever scientifically appropriate.

Increasing arteriovenous fistulas in hemodialysis patients: Problems and solutions

Increasing arteriovenous fistulas in hemodialysis patients: Problems and solutions

Capitalizing on women's intellectual capital in the professions.

omen and minorities nowmake up almost 80% of thelabor force. Yet women inthe professions, including those in aca-demic medicine, live in a half-changedworld. Women make up more than halfof college students and almost half ofthe students in most professions. Andthere have been large numbers ofwomen in the faculty pipeline in highereducation and academic medicine forover two decades now—plenty of timefor them to emerge from the other endas major players and leaders. But re-search on women’s careers demonstratesthat increasing the number of womenentering the pipeline is not translatinginto substantially increased numbers ofwomen professors. The AmericanCouncil on Education reports that only13% of doctorate-granting institutionsare headed by women, and the Associ-ation of American Medical Colleges re-ports that only 8% of medical schooldepartment chairs are women. Thus,while women have achieved equal ac-cess to higher education and other pro-fessions, we as a society are still wastinga great deal of their potential. How canwe better capitalize on women’s intel-lectual capital?*

Individual Agency and the Life Course: Do Low-Ses Students Get Less Long-Term Payoff for Their School Efforts?

Educational attainment has an important impact on the entire life course. This study adopts the life course emphasis on personal agency to examine the relationship between individual effort and later educational attainment and the possibility that individuals get different payoffs for their personal efforts, depending on their social class. Using the 10-year follow-up of the High School and Beyond (HSB) survey, this study finds that the customary approach to educational attainment is wrong on two counts. First, we find that students' high school efforts have a significant relationship with later educational attainment, even independent of academic achievement. Second, we find that socioeconomic status (SES) affects effort, effort predicts attainment net of SES, and the benefits of effort vary by SES. These results imply that efforts matter, but even if low-SES students strive very hard, their outcomes may not be improved as much as those of other students and so they may have less incentive for school effort.

Coordination of Long-Term and Short-Term Payoffs in Dynamic Bimatrix Games

Dynamic optimality principles are applied to construct equilibrium solutions in evolutionary bimatrix games. The dynamics of the model can be interpreted as Kolmogorov’s differential equations in which coefficients describing flows are not fixed a priori and can be chosen on the feedback principle. Long-term payoffs of coalitions are defined on the infinite horizon by the integral functionals. A peculiarity of the model is the coordination of velocities of solutions constructed for long-term payoff integrals with directions of gradients of short-term payoffs. The notion of a dynamic Nash equilibrium is introduced in the class of control feedbacks. A solution based on the notion of guaranteeing feedbacks is proposed. Discontinuous guaranteeing feedbacks are constructed using generalized methods of characteristics and switching regimes are indicated.

If disaster strikes, can your business rise from the ashes?

The article explains how and why planning your insurance coverage wisely can help you prepare for computer disasters. Although most people hear about disaster planning time and again, it's only when disaster hits that they fully recognize how important it is to be prepared. Your agent can help you find the right insurance company so you can start preparing today. It is a given that finding time to develop an alternate operating plan is difficult, and insurance may not be the most exciting thing you will ever discuss. But a short-term investment can reap long-term payoffs. Ultimately, you will gain the peace of mind of knowing that your policy adequately reflects the types of losses and expenses you would face should the unthinkable happen.

Mid-career and Senior Faculty: Maintaining Vitality and Productivity

Over the past 25 years, faculty and their work have been studied on an intensive level. In 1977, Sarason defined a “one life—one career” model, in which faculty are “called” to a profession. Numerous studies, beginning with Hodgekinson (1974) and Baldwin and Blackburn (1981), indicate that faculty as adult learners continue to explore new interests and redefine careers, particularly as age and experience increase. Although the institutional context is a mediating factor, a number of researchers, including Baldwin (1985), Creswell, et. al. (1990), Schuster and Wheeler (1990), Simpson (1990), and Sorcinelli and Austin (1992) have identified a range of faculty needs and strategies which can aid in meeting these needs. Department chairs and faculty colleagues are identified as crucial in encouraging changes to maintain faculty vitality, and to encourage preventative action rather than remediation. Such investments in human capital have both short-term and long-term payoffs [Simpson (1990) and Schuster and Wheeler (1990)].

Mid-career and Senior Faculty: Maintaining Vitality and Productivity

Over the past 25 years, faculty and their work have been studied on an intensive level. In 1977, Sarason defined a “one life—one career” model, in which faculty are “called” to a profession. Numerous studies, beginning with Hodgekinson (1974) and Baldwin and Blackburn (1981), indicate that faculty as adult learners continue to explore new interests and redefine careers, particularly as age and experience increase. Although the institutional context is a mediating factor, a number of researchers, including Baldwin (1985), Creswell, et. al. (1990), Schuster and Wheeler (1990), Simpson (1990), and Sorcinelli and Austin (1992) have identified a range of faculty needs and strategies which can aid in meeting these needs. Department chairs and faculty colleagues are identified as crucial in encouraging changes to maintain faculty vitality, and to encourage preventative action rather than remediation. Such investments in human capital have both short-term and long-term payoffs [Simpson (1990) and Schuster and Wheeler (1990)].

Why rich brands get richer, and what to do about it

C onventional wisdom, largely based on PIMS data, nudges a brand manager toward the pursuit of market share even if it comes at the cost of lower margins. The same orthodoxies suggest to executives appraising a strategic plan that they should funnel cash to almost-leader brands even if it means they must divest small-share brands to acquire the necessalT funds. MBA students are taught that profit follows market share in the general case. But without an understanding of why this relationship might occur, it is difficult to know whether a specific company or product category exemplifies or defies the conventional wisdom. Therefore, it seems useful to ti T to analyze the rationale for expecting long-term payoff for a leading brand versus a small-share brand, and to clarify why the rich brand gets richer. At least three explanations can be offered, one recently published and two presented here to buttress the same viewpoint: large-share brands are the likeliest to gain share. All three arguments for this generalization rest on observations of a snowball effect from category leadership: leading brands have a disproportionate advantage simply because they are leading brands. One explanation for this snowball effect is presented by Ehrenberg et al. (1990), who conclude that small-share brands face double jeopardy. Not only do fewer buyers select them, but they select them less often than the buyers of dominant brands select their favorites. The authors explain this p h e n o m e n o n convincingly using both statistics and psychology. They point out that small-share brands suffer disproportionately from the consumer propensity to buy more than one brand within a product ca tegoiT-to split their patronage among multiple brands. The problem for the small-share brand is that splitters whose first choice is a follower brand are disproportionately likely to divide their purchases between that follower brand and a leader, because they are aware of the leader. By contrast, splitters who favor a leading brand are less aware of small brands. Thus, their splitting represents a smaller proportion of total purchases going to other than their favorite brand. There is a greater likelihood that when they do stray beyond their favorite, they will select another large-share brand, not a smallshare brand. However, it is an oversimplification to assert that rich brands get richer only because of the behavior of splitters. The case becomes even stronger when two additional arguments are taken into account: some leading brands are chosen because of a wish to do what others do, and some are chosen because of a wish to conform to the tastes of as large a group as possible. These two issues will be discussed in turn.

Teen Parents and Child Support

Teenaged childbearing is becoming increasingly important in both the growing numbers of female-headed families and the rise in numbers of children eligible for child support. In this paper, we use a new data set from Wisconsin to estimate the participation and experience of teen parents in the child support system. Our analysis mdicates that the current child support system is not very effective in alleviating the severe economic consequences of single parenthood experienced by teen mothers. Our analysis also suggests that for the child support system to have a positive impact on the economic well-being of these families we must concentrate on long-term payoffs rather than short-term costs.

The future of amorphous silicon: If, when and how?

The extraordinary progress in research, development and now commercialization of the amorphous silicon thin film technology is indeed a high technology Cinderella story. Barely 14 years have elapsed since hydrogenated amorphous silicon films were first produced by plasma deposition from silane (R. C. Chittick, J. H. Alexander and H. F. Sterling, J. Electrochem. Soc., 116 (1969) 77), with most of the success falling into the last 7 years. The U.S. Department of Energy-Solar Energy Research Institute target efficiency goal of 10% for small cells has been met, and small-scale production for consumer applications has been initiated by several companies, both in the U.S.A. and elsewhere. Although the near-term success of amorphous silicon for selected applications is assured, the long-term use of photovoltaics for energy-significant applications ( i.e. grid-connected utility power generation) places very stringent cost and performance requirements on the technology, clouding the eventual deployment of the current amorphous silicon technology for this important market. The research progress and breakthroughs that will be required are high risk, but the long-term pay-off is potentially very lucrative.

Co-oping: A short-term option with long-term payoffs: A “co-op” exhibits self-confidence, experience, and a perspective other students don't have. There are benefits for academia and industry too

More and more colleges and corporations are taking part in a growing option of higher education known as cooperative education, or the coop program. The co-op concept, which was started in 1906 at the University of Cincinnati by Professor Herman Schneider, is based on the idea that students should be able to get practical experience to supplement their course work. Ann Keeling, assistant dean/associate professor in the division of professional practices at the University of Cincinnati, says that Schneider's proposal to the university was well received, as it has been at over 1000 colleges since. “If you look around,” says Penn State co-op advisor William J. Ross in agreement, “you will find that there are relatively few schools that don't have some of their students in this kind of a program.”

Environmental Quality as A Policy and Planning Objective

Abstract Environmental quality can be considered as one of several partially conflicting goals of national policy. Some of its elements are incorporated in goals for economic growth and 'public health, but amenity and ecological values must be treated separately. In contrast to the narrow problem-solving approach, multiple-objective planning evaluates environmental quality issues in terms of their contribution to all major public objectives. A preferred environmental quality strategy combines indirect and direct means of influence. Indirect means, such as environmental monitoring, public information, research, and support of decentralized decisionmaking, offer large long-term payoffs. Direct regulation and legal sanctions also are necessary, particularly for short-run improvement.