Graphical Representation of Missing Data Problems

Rubin’s classic missingness mechanisms are central to handling missing data and minimizing biases that can arise due to missingness. However, the formulaic expressions that posit certain independencies among missing and observed data are difficult to grasp. As a result, applied researchers often rely on informal translations of these assumptions. We present a graphical representation of missing data mechanism, formalized in Mohan, Pearl, and Tian (2013). We show that graphical models provide a tool for comprehending, encoding, and communicating assumptions about the missingness process. Furthermore, we demonstrate on several examples how graph-theoretical criteria can determine if biases due to missing data might emerge in some estimates of interests and which auxiliary variables are needed to control for such biases, given assumptions about the missingness process.     

Crux of time management for students

At the beginning of each academic session, I typically devote a class or two to share my tips on time management and personal productivity with newly admitted students at the Central University of Punjab. I believe this is a crucial first step for students, as the curriculum hardly contains any information on either. I also notice that an article on this important theme is altogether non-existent. In this write-up, some of the most important methods of time management and personal productivity are thoroughly reviewed before concluding with a few pedagogical suggestions for teachers to ensure that their students manage time efficiently and be more productive with their studies and research.     

Broadcasting and Cable

Larry James Gianakos' Television Drama Series Programming: A Comprehensive Chronicle, 1959-1975 (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1978—$27.50)

Albert C. Book and Norman D. Cary's The Radio and Television Commercial (Chicago: Crain Books, 1978—$6.95, paper)

Jay S. Harris's TV Guide: The First 25 Years (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1978—$14.95)

Steven R. Rivkin's A New Guide to Federal Cable Television Regulations (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1978—$25.00)

Felix Chin's Cable Television: A Comprehensive Bibliography (New York: Plenum Publishing, 1978—$45.00)     

Children's developing commitments to joint goals

This study investigated young children's commitment to a joint goal by assessing whether peers in collaborative activities continue to collaborate until all received their rewards. Forty-eight 2.5- and 3.5-year-old children worked on an apparatus dyadically. One child got access to her reward early. For the partner to benefit as well, this child had to continue to collaborate even though there was no further reward available to her. The study found that 3.5-year-olds, but not 2.5-year-olds, eagerly assisted their unlucky partner. They did this less readily in a noncollaborative control condition. A second study confirmed that 2.5-year-old children understood the task structure. These results suggest that children begin to appreciate the normative dimensions of collaborative activities during the 3rd year of life.     

Reforms in pedagogy and the Confucian tradition: looking below the surface

This Forum article addresses some of the issues raised in the article by Ying-Syuan Huang and Anila Asghar’s paper entitled: Science education reform in Confucian learning cultures: teachers’ perspectives on policy and practice in Taiwan. An attempt is made to highlight the need for a more nuanced approach in considering the Confucian education tradition and its compatibility with education reforms. In particular, the article discusses issues concerning the historical development of the Confucian education tradition, challenges in reform implementation that are in reality tradition-independent, as well as opportunities and points of convergence that the Confucian education tradition presents that can in fact be favorable to implementation of reform-based pedagogies.     

Failures and Successes: Notes on the Development of Electronic Cash

Between 1997 and 2001, two mid-sized communities in Canada hosted North America's most comprehensive experiment to introduce electronic cash and, in the process, replace physical cash for casual, low-value payments. The technology used was Mondex, and its implementation was supported by all the country's major banks. It was launched with an extensive publicity campaign to promote Mondex not only in the domestic but also in the global market, for which the Canadian implementation was to serve as a "showcase." However, soon after the start of the first field test it became apparent that the new technology did not work smoothly. On the contrary, it created a host of controversies, in areas as varied as computer security, consumer privacy, and monetary policy. In the following years, few of these controversies could be resolved and Mondex could not be established as a widely used payment mechanism. In 2001, the experiment was finally terminated. Using the concepts developed in recent science and technology studies (STS), this article analyzes these controversies as resulting from the difficulties of fitting electronic cash, a new sociotechnical system, into the complex setting of the existing payment system. Implementing a new technology is seen as a long process in which social and technological actors are required to adapt to one another. In the Mondex case, such adaptation did not happen sufficiently to stabilize the sociotechnical network as a whole. However, in some limited areas mutual adaptation did occur, and there the Mondex experiment produced some surprising successes. In this perspective, the story of Mondex not only offers lessons on why technologies fail, but also offers insight how short-term failures can contribute to long-term transformations. This suggests the need to rethink the dichotomy of success and failure.     

Migratory plans of Portuguese adolescents

A substantial proportion of northern Portuguese adolescents belonging to lower and middle socioeconomic levels plan to eventually migrate abroad. Migratory plans therefore join academic and career plans in forming adolescents' overall personal plans. This paper considers motivations, awareness, and characteristics of 511 8th graders living in Oporto and the Braganca area who stated their intentions to migrate. The intention to migrate proved especially significant in the personal plans of youths from rural areas and of low socioeconomic status. In proportions comparable to that found among migrant workers, unemployment, low pay, and thwarted aspirations fueled the desire to migrate. The percentage of youths firmly committed to relocating increased with age, while overall increased desire to emigrate has been linked to rising domestic unemployment. Respondents were also largely aware of the potential physical, emotional, and psychological problems of living and working abroad. Migration plans were found to directly interfere with students' academic and careers plans. Those planning to migrate were less likely to consider further education and engagement in highly skilled occupations.     

Open and distance education as a strategy for human capital development in Nigeria

The development of human capital has been identified as the most important component of all the factors employed in production economics. Since independence in 1960, Nigeria has placed great emphasis on training and education for human capital formation. However, the education process as the primary means of developing human resource has failed, in its conventional mode, to fulfil the needs of the country. This paper therefore examines the impact of open and distance learning on the human capital development processes in teacher education and other areas in Nigeria, presenting an overview of human capital development efforts in Nigeria with a focus on the tertiary education system. The study also maps out the potential benefits and logical justifications for the application of distance learning systems in the training and development of professionals for the industrial and corporate sectors of the economy. In conclusion, a proposal is made for the full‐scale adoption of open and distance learning as a fundamental strategy for human resource development in the country.     

Educational family background and the realisation of educational career intentions: participation of German upper secondary graduates in higher education over time

In this article, we evaluate the impact of social origin on the realisation of educational intentions at the time of becoming eligible for higher education in Germany. In general, we find high persistence of intentions and actual attendance of higher education. However, effects of parental education on the changes of educational intentions increase the existing social inequality with regard to higher education at the time of leaving secondary school. The group which is affected most are those young adults planning to study after vocational training—while the gap between different origin groups does not widen much during other stop-outs from education. This can be explained only partly by previous educational performance. The findings suggest that estimates of educational inequality are attenuated when entry into higher education is approximated by educational intentions of young adults.