National indicators of health literacy: ability to understand health information and to engage actively with healthcare providers - a population-based survey among Danish adults

Health literacy is a multidimensional concept covering a range of cognitive and social skills necessary for participation in health care. Knowledge of health literacy levels in general populations and how health literacy levels impacts on social health inequity is lacking. The primary aim of this study was to perform a population-based assessment of dimensions of health literacy related to understanding health information and to engaging with healthcare providers. Secondly, the aim was to examine associations between socio-economic characteristics with these dimensions of health literacy.

Gender differences in conference presentations: a consequence of self-selection?

Women continue to be under-represented in the sciences, with their representation declining at each progressive academic level. These differences persist despite long-running policies to ameliorate gender inequity. We compared gender differences in exposure and visibility at an evolutionary biology conference for attendees at two different academic levels: student and post-PhD academic. Despite there being almost exactly a 1:1 ratio of women and men attending the conference, we found that when considering only those who presented talks, women spoke for far less time than men of an equivalent academic level: on average student women presented for 23% less time than student men, and academic women presented for 17% less time than academic men. We conducted more detailed analyses to tease apart whether this gender difference was caused by decisions made by the attendees or through bias in evaluation of the abstracts. At both academic levels, women and men were equally likely to request a presentation. However, women were more likely than men to prefer a short talk, regardless of academic level. We discuss potential underlying reasons for this gender bias, and provide recommendations to avoid similar gender biases at future conferences.

Lying about the price? Ultimatum bargaining with messages and imperfectly observed offers

We introduce the taxicab game, related to the ultimatum game and Gehrig et al.'s (2007) yes/no game. The proposer makes an offer, and simultaneously sends a cheap talk message indicating (possibly falsely) the amount of the offer. The responder observes the message with certainty and the offer with probability p before accepting or rejecting the offer. We investigate versions with p=. 0 and p=. 0.5 along with the ultimatum game as a baseline. Intuition and a model comprising both standard economic agents and others who dislike inequity, lies and lying provide clear predictions that our experimental results support. As the likelihood increases of offers being seen, the offers themselves increase, messages over-state them less, and responders are more likely to accept (even when the offer is unseen). Also, responders are more likely to accept after truthful messages than after lies or when no message is sent.

Perceived fairness of pay among people with and without disabilities: a propensity score matched analysis of working Australians

OBJECTIVES: Equity and fairness at work are associated with a range of organizational and health outcomes. Past research suggests that workers with disabilities experience inequity in the workplace. It is difficult to conclude whether the presence of disability is the reason for perceived unfair treatment due to the possible confounding of effect estimates by other demographic or socioeconomic factors. METHODS: The data source was the Household, Income, and Labor Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey (2001-2012). Propensity for disability was calculated from logistic models including gender, age, education, country of birth, and father's occupational skill level as predictors. We then used nearest neighbor (on propensity score) matched analysis to match workers with disabilities to workers without disability. RESULTS: Results suggest that disability is independently associated with lower fairness of pay after controlling for confounding factors in the propensity score matched analysis; although results do suggest less than half a standard deviation difference, indicating small effects. Similar results were apparent in standard multivariable regression models and alternative propensity score analyses (stratification, covariate adjustment using the propensity score, and inverse probability of treatment weighting). CONCLUSIONS: Whilst neither multivariable regression nor propensity scores adjust for unmeasured confounding, and there remains the potential for other biases, similar results for the two methodological approaches to confounder adjustment provide some confidence of an independent association of disability with perceived unfairness of pay. Based on this, we suggest that the disparity in the perceived fairness of pay between people with and without disabilities may be explained by worse treatment of people with disabilities in the workplace.

Oxytocin enhances the appropriate use of human social cues by the domestic dog (Canis familiaris) in an object choice task

It has been postulated that the neuropeptide, oxytocin, is involved in human-dog bonding. This may explain why dogs, compared to wolves, are such good performers on object choice tasks, which test their ability to attend to, and use, human social cues in order to find hidden food treats. The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of intranasal oxytocin administration, which is known to increase social cognition in humans, on domestic dogs' ability to perform such a task. We hypothesised that dogs would perform better on the task after an intranasal treatment of oxytocin. Sixty-two (31 males and 31 females) pet dogs completed the experiment over two different testing sessions, 5-15 days apart. Intranasal oxytocin or a saline control was administered 45 min before each session. All dogs received both treatments in a pseudo-randomised, counterbalanced order. Data were collected as scores out of ten for each of the four blocks of trials in each session. Two blocks of trials were conducted using a momentary distal pointing cue and two using a gazing cue, given by the experimenter. Oxytocin enhanced performance using momentary distal pointing cues, and this enhanced level of performance was maintained over 5-15 days time in the absence of oxytocin. Oxytocin also decreased aversion to gazing cues, in that performance was below chance levels after saline administration but at chance levels after oxytocin administration.

Win at all costs or lose gracefully in high-stakes competition? Gender differences in professional tennis

This article examines line-call challenges by male and female professional tennis players in major tournaments around the world. In terms of utilization rates, we find that the genders behave similarly. Nevertheless, we do detect some intriguing gender differences in these challenges. First, male players’ challenges are more likely to be provoked by those of their opponents. More importantly, at tiebreaks, females are more likely to reverse an umpire’s unfavorable call, while males make relatively more unsuccessful challenges. Furthermore, we find that men are a lot more likely to make “embarrassing” line-call challenges at tiebreaks and offenses (i.e., when the shot lands at the opponent’s side of the tennis court) than women. These significant gender differences suggest that women particularly diverge from men at crucial junctures of the match such as tiebreaks. Differences in factors such as risk aversion, overconfidence, pride, shame, and strategic signalling behavior might help us to explain these gender-difference findings in line call challenges.

Gender difference in treatment and mortality of patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction admitted to Victorian public hospitals: A retrospective database study.

BACKGROUND: Death from acute coronary syndrome (ACS) is avoidable with early reperfusion therapy, however, evidence suggests inequity in women's ACS treatment within a number of international healthcare systems, when compared to men's. Research indicates mortality rates are higher in some age groups of women when compared to men for the sub-group of ACS known as ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI). OBJECTIVE: To determine whether patient sex was associated with patterns of reperfusion treatment variation or increased inhospital mortality in patients with STEMI. METHODS: We undertook retrospective analyses on a government database for patients admitted to Victorian public hospitals with STEMI. Patients were categorised into two age groups: 18-64 and 65-84 years (inclusive), to determine whether patient sex and these age groups influenced treatment from 2005 to 2008 and mortality from 2005 to 2010. RESULTS: Both younger and older women received less frequent angioplasty with stent and more often received no reperfusion treatment than men in corresponding younger and older age groups (p=0.006 and p<0.001, respectively). Overall, women in both age groups were more likely to die inhospital than men from equivalent age groups with STEMI (p<0.001, both groups). CONCLUSIONS: Proportionately, both younger and older women received less interventional reperfusion therapy for STEMI than their male cohorts, and died more often during admission than men. Further research needs to be undertaken to verify the findings and causes, and guide future research to ensure application of evidence to treatment in patients with STEMI.

Psychosocial job quality in a national sample of working Australians: a comparison of persons working with versus without disability

Objectives: There is growing international policy interest in disability employment, yet there has been little investigation of job quality among people working with disability. This study uses Australian national data to compare the psychosocial job quality of people working with versus without disability. Methods: We used 10 annual waves of data from a large representative Australian panel survey to estimate the proportion of the population experiencing poorer psychosocial job quality (overall and by individual 'adversities' of low job control, high demands, high insecurity, and low fairness of pay) by disability status and impairment type. We used logistic regression to examine the pooled cross-sectional associations between disability and job quality, adjusting for age, sex, education and job type. Results: Those working with any disability showed approximately 25% higher odds of reporting one or more adversity at work (OR: 1.23, 95% CI: 1.15, 1.31), and this finding was consistent across impairment types with the exception of intellectual/developmental disability. Estimates were largely unchanged after adjustments. Similar results were found for reporting two or more adversities compared one or more. Conclusions: We observed that working people with a disability in Australia reported systematically poorer psychosocial job quality than those working without disability. These results suggest the need for further research to understand the reasons for these patterns, as well as policy and practice efforts to address this inequity.

Gender issues in elementary mathematics teaching materials: a comparative study between China and Australia

International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) cross-national studies (FIMS, SIMS and TIMSS) show that gender differences in mathematical achievements and attitudes have decreased considerably over thirty years (Hanna, 2000), however, mathematics is still historically stereotyped as a male domain with crucial evidence supporting this belief (Forgasz, Leder, & Kloosterman, 2009). Previous research showed that gender differences in mathematics participation,performance and achievement existed widely in the majority of English speaking countries, specifically favouring boys (Forgasz, 1992; Hyde, Fennema, & Lamon, 1990; Tiedemann, 2000). Hyde, Lindberg, Linn, Ellis and Williams (2008) pointed out that the stereotype that females lack mathematical ability persists and is widely held by parents and teachers.Mathematics teaching materials play an important role in mathematics teaching and learning. The contents within mathematical teaching materials are rational, and deliver both explicit and implicit information. The explicit information refers to mathematics knowledge that students can learn from textbooks, while the latter one, also named as hidden curriculum, contains social and cultural messages. Hidden curriculum is a side effect of education. It has deep and long-term influences on students’ construction of math-gender stereotype that impact their future mathematicallearning (Zhang & Zhou, 2008). Therefore, this study will investigate Chinese andAustralian elementary mathematics teaching materials to explore the messages of gender equity and inequity delivered through hidden curriculum including names, images and problem-solving contexts. Based on the findings, practical implications concerning the promotion of equitable gender environments within elementary mathematics teaching materials from a cross-cultural perspective will be discussed.

Role of index bonds in an optimal dynamic asset allocation model with real subsistence consumption

We investigate the role of index bonds in a dynamic consumption and asset allocation model where the rate of real consumption at any given time cannot fall below a fixed level. An explicit form of the optimal consumption and portfolio rule for a class of Constant Relative Risk Aversion (CRRA) utility functions is derived. Consumption increases above the subsistence level only when wealth exceeds a threshold value. Risky investments in equity and nominal bonds are initially proportional to the excess of wealth over a lower bound, and then increase nonlinearly with wealth. The desirability of investing in the risky assets are related to the agent’s risk preference, the equity premium, and the inflation risk premium. The demand for index bonds is also obtained. The results should be useful for the management of defined benefit pension funds, university endowments, and other portfolios which have a withdrawal pre-commitment in real terms.

Is Roger Federer more loss averse than Serena Williams?

Using data from the high-stakes 2013 Dubai professional tennis tournament, we find that, compared with a tied score, (i) male players have a higher serve speed and thus exhibit more effort when behind in score, and their serve speeds get less sensitive to losses or gains when score difference gets too large, and (ii) female players do not change their serve speed when behind, while serving slower when ahead. Thus, male players comply more with Prospect Theory exhibiting more loss aversion and reflection effect. Our results are robust to controlling for player fixed effects and characteristics with player random effects.