Limited managerial attention and corporate aging

As firms have more assets in place, more of management’s limited attention is focused on managing assets in place rather than developing new growth options. Consequently, as firms grow older, they have fewer growth options and a lower ability to generate new growth options. This simple theory predicts that Tobin’s q falls with age. Further, competition in the product market is expected to slow down the decrease in Tobin’s q because it forces firms to look for alternative sources of rents. Similarly, greater competition in the labor market reduces the decrease in Tobin’s q with age because old firms are in a better position to hire employees that can help with innovation. In contrast, competition in the market for corporate control should accelerate the decline because it forces management to focus more on managing assets in place whose performance is more directly observable than on developing growth options where results may not be observable for some time. We find strong support for these predictions in tests using exogenous variation in competition.

Limited managerial attention and corporate aging

As firms have more assets in place, more of management’s limited attention is focused on managing assets in place rather than developing new growth options. Consequently, as firms grow older, they have fewer growth options and a lower ability to generate new growth options. This simple theory predicts that Tobin’s q falls with age. Further, competition in the product market is expected to slow down the decrease in Tobin’s q because it forces firms to look for alternative sources of rents. Similarly, greater competition in the labor market reduces the decrease in Tobin’s q with age because old firms are in a better position to hire employees that can help with innovation. In contrast, competition in the market for corporate control should accelerate the decline because it forces management to focus more on managing assets in place whose performance is more directly observable than on developing growth options where results may not be observable for some time. We find strong support for these predictions in tests using exogenous variation in competition

Plasma copeptin levels before and during exogenous arginine vasopressin infusion in patients with advanced vasodilatory shock

Plasma copeptin levels before and during exogenous arginine vasopressin infusion (AVP) were evaluated, and the value of copeptin levels before AVP therapy to predict complications during AVP therapy and outcome in vasodilatory shock patients was determined.

Time-referenced effects of an internal vs. external focus of attention on muscular activity and compensatory variability

The paralysis-by-analysis phenomenon, i.e., attending to the execution of one's movement impairs performance, has gathered a lot of attention over recent years (see Wulf, 2007, for a review). Explanations of this phenomenon, e.g., the hypotheses of constrained action (Wulf et al., 2001) or of step-by-step execution (Masters, 1992; Beilock et al., 2002), however, do not refer to the level of underlying mechanisms on the level of sensorimotor control. For this purpose, a “nodal-point hypothesis” is presented here with the core assumption that skilled motor behavior is internally based on sensorimotor chains of nodal points, that attending to intermediate nodal points leads to a muscular re-freezing of the motor system at exactly and exclusively these points in time, and that this re-freezing is accompanied by the disruption of compensatory processes, resulting in an overall decrease of motor performance. Two experiments, on lever sequencing and basketball free throws, respectively, are reported that successfully tested these time-referenced predictions, i.e., showing that muscular activity is selectively increased and compensatory variability selectively decreased at movement-related nodal points if these points are in the focus of attention.

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and glial integrity: an exploration of associations of cytokines and kynurenine metabolites with symptoms and attention

In contrast to studies of depression and psychosis, the first part of this study showed no major differences in serum levels of cytokines and tryptophan metabolites between healthy children and those with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder of the combined type (ADHD). Yet, small decreases of potentially toxic kynurenine metabolites and increases of cytokines were evident in subgroups. Therefore we examined predictions of biochemical associations with the major symptom clusters, measures of attention and response variability.

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and glial integrity: S100B, cytokines and kynurenine metabolism--effects of medication

Children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) show a marked temporal variability in their display of symptoms and neuropsychological performance. This could be explained in terms of an impaired glial supply of energy to support neuronal activity.

Social cognition in attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is associated with a range of cognitive deficits and social cognition impairments, which might be interpreted in the context of fronto-striatal dysfunction. So far only few studies have addressed the issue of social cognition deficits in ADHD.