Data replication and extension: A commentary

Honig and Samuelsson (2014) and Delmar (2015) recently had an exchange in this journal related to a replication-and-extension attempt of two papers which originally arrived at different conclusions based on the same data set. This commentary provides further clarification on the issues and links the debate to broader issues scholarly culture and practices in entrepreneurship research.

Post-diagnostic prescriptions for low-dose aspirin and breast cancer-specific survival: a nested case-control study in a breast cancer cohort from the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink

INTRODUCTION: Recent observational studies indicate that post-diagnostic use of aspirin in breast cancer patients may protect against cancer progression perhaps by inhibiting cyclooxygenase-2 dependent mechanisms. Evidence also supports a crucial role for interactions between tumour cells and circulating platelets in cancer growth and dissemination, therefore, use of low-dose aspirin may reduce the risk of death from cancer in breast cancer patients.

METHODS: A cohort of newly diagnosed breast cancer patients (1998 to 2006) were identified in the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink (and confirmed by cancer registry linkage). Cancer-specific deaths were identified up to 2011 from Office for National Statistics mortality data. A nested case-control analysis was conducted using conditional logistic regression to compare post-diagnostic aspirin exposure using General Practice prescription data in 1,435 cases (breast cancer deaths) with 5,697 controls (matched by age and year of diagnosis).

RESULTS: After breast cancer diagnosis, 18.3% of cancer-specific deaths and 18.5% of matched controls received at least one prescription for low-dose aspirin, corresponding to an odds ratio (OR) of 0.98 (95% CI 0.83, 1.15). Adjustment for potential confounders (including stage and grade) had little impact on this estimate. No dose response relationship was observed when the number of tablets was investigated and no associations were seen when analyses were stratified by receipt of prescriptions for aspirin in the pre-diagnostic period, by stage at diagnosis or by receipt of prescriptions for hormone therapy.

CONCLUSIONS: Overall, in this large population-based cohort of breast cancer patients, there was little evidence of an association between receipt of post-diagnostic prescriptions for low-dose aspirin and breast cancer-specific death. However, information was not available on medication compliance or over-the-counter use of aspirin, which may have contributed to the null findings.

Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug Use is Not Associated With Reduced Risk of Barrett’s Esophagus

OBJECTIVES: Regular use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) is associated with a reduced risk of esophageal adenocarcinoma. Epidemiological studies examining the association between NSAID use and the risk of the precursor lesion, Barrett’s esophagus, have been inconclusive.

METHODS: We analyzed pooled individual-level participant data from six case-control studies of Barrett’s esophagus in the Barrett’s and Esophageal Adenocarcinoma Consortium (BEACON). We compared medication use from 1474 patients with Barrett’s esophagus separately with two control groups: 2256 population-based controls and 2018 gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) controls. Study-specific odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were estimated using multivariable logistic regression models and were combined using a random effects meta-analytic model.

RESULTS: Regular (at least once weekly) use of any NSAIDs was not associated with the risk of Barrett’s esophagus (vs. population-based controls, adjusted OR = 1.00, 95% CI = 0.76–1.32; I2=61%; vs. GERD controls, adjusted OR = 0.99, 95% CI = 0.82–1.19; I2=19%). Similar null findings were observed among individuals who took aspirin or non-aspirin NSAIDs. We also found no association with highest levels of frequency (at least daily use) and duration (≥5 years) of NSAID use. There was evidence of moderate between-study heterogeneity; however, associations with NSAID use remained non-significant in “leave-one-out” sensitivity analyses.

CONCLUSIONS: Use of NSAIDs was not associated with the risk of Barrett’s esophagus. The previously reported inverse association between NSAID use and esophageal adenocarcinoma may be through reducing the risk of neoplastic progression in patients with Barrett’s esophagus.

Effects of introspection on meta and structural attitude bases

Introspection is the process by which individuals question their attitudes; either questioning why they hold their attitudes (Why introspection), or how they feel about a particular attitude object (How introspection). Previous research has suggested that Why-introspection induces attitude change, and that Why and How introspection influence attitude-behaviour consistency,persuasion, and other effects. Generally, psychologists have assumed that affective and cognitive attitude bases are the mechanism by which introspection leads to these effects. Leading perspectives originating from these findings suggest that either Why introspection changes the content of cognitive attitude bases (the skewness hypothesis), or increases the salience of cognitive attitude bases (the dominance hypothesis); whereas How introspection may increase the salience of affective attitude bases (another part of the dominance hypothesis). However, direct evidence for these mechanisms is lacking, and the distinction between structural and meta bases has not been considered. Two studies investigated this gap in the existing literature. Both studies measured undergraduate students’ attitudes and attitude bases (both structural and meta, affective and cognitive) before and after engaging in an introspection manipulation (Why introspection / How introspection / control), and after reading a (affective / cognitive) persuasive passage about the attitude object. No evidence was found supporting either the skewness or dominance hypotheses. Furthermore, previous introspection effects were not replicated in the present data. Possible reasons for these null findings are proposed, and several unexpected effects are examined.

The Effect of Supportive Social Interaction Priming on Children's Prosocial Comforing Responses to Distressed Others

The ability to sensitively care for others’ wellbeing develops early in ontogeny and is an important developmental milestone for healthy social, emotional, and moral development. One facet of care for others, prosocial comforting, has been linked with important social outcomes such as peer acceptance and friendship quality, underscoring the importance of determining factors involved in the ability to comfort. Although social support has been linked with a number of important social outcomes, no study has directly examined whether felt social support can foster children’s positive behavior toward others. The purpose of the current investigation was to use an experimental priming paradigm to demonstrate that felt social support a) enhances children’s ability to respond prosocially to the distress of others and b) decreases children’s expressions of personal distress when faced with the distress of another person. Participants were 94 4-year-old children (M = 53.56 months, SD = 3.38 months; 52 girls). Children were randomly assigned to either view pictures of mothers and children in close, personal interactions (supportive social interaction condition), happy women and children in separate pictures, presented side-by-side (happy control condition), or pictures of colorful overlapping shapes (neutral control condition). Each set of 20 pictures was presented in the context of a categorization computer game that participants played 4 times throughout the course of the study. Immediately following the first three computer games, children were given the opportunity to comfort someone who was distressed; twice it was the adult experimenter working with the child, and once it was an unseen infant crying over a monitor that participants had been trained to use. Comforting behaviors and distress/arousal were coded in 10-second time segments and yielded a global comforting score and a distress proportion score for each task. Results indicated that priming condition had no effect on either prosocial comforting behavior or expressions of personal distress. I discuss these null findings in light of the available literatures on priming mental representations in children and on prosocial comforting, and suggest some future directions for continued investigation in both fields.

Complex genetic findings in a female patient with pyruvate dehydrogenase complex deficiency: Null mutations in the PDHX gene associated with unusual expression of the testis-specific PDHA2 gene in her somatic cells

Human pyruvate dehydrogenase complex (PDC) catalyzes a key step in the generation of cellular energy and is composed by three catalytic elements (E1, E2, E3), one structural subunit (E3-binding protein), and specific regulatory elements, phosphatases and kinases (PDKs, PDPs). The E1α subunit exists as two isoforms encoded by different genes: PDHA1 located on Xp22.1 and expressed in somatic tissues, and the intronless PDHA2 located on chromosome 4 and only detected in human spermatocytes and spermatids. We report on a young adult female patient who has PDC deficiency associated with a compound heterozygosity in PDHX encoding the E3-binding protein. Additionally, in the patient and in all members of her immediate family, a full-length testis-specific PDHA2 mRNA and a 5′UTR-truncated PDHA1 mRNA were detected in circulating lymphocytes and cultured fibroblasts, being bothmRNAs translated into full-length PDHA2 and PDHA1 proteins, resulting in the co-existence of both PDHA isoforms in somatic cells.Moreover, we observed that DNA hypomethylation of a CpG island in the coding region of PDHA2 gene is associatedwith the somatic activation of this gene transcription in these individuals. This study represents the first natural model of the de-repression of the testis-specific PDHA2 gene in human somatic cells, and raises some questions related to the somatic activation of this gene as a potential therapeutic approach for most forms of PDC deficiency.

GSTM1 and GSTT1 null polymorphisms and risk of salivary gland carcinoma.

Glutathione S-transferase (GST) genes detoxify and metabolize carcinogens, including oxygen free radicals which may contribute to salivary gland carcinogenesis. This cancer center-based case-control association study included 166 patients with incident salivary gland carcinoma (SGC) and 511 cancer-free controls. We performed multiplex polymerase chain reaction-based polymorphism genotyping assays for GSTM1 and GSTT1 null genotypes. Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated with multivariable logistic regression analyses adjusted for age, sex, ethnicity, tobacco use, family history of cancer, alcohol use and radiation exposure. In our results, 27.7% of the SGC cases and 20.6% of the controls were null for the GSTT1 (P = 0.054), and 53.0% of the SGC cases and 50.9% of the controls were null for the GSTM1 (P = 0.633). The results of the adjusted multivariale regression analysis suggested that having GSTT1 null genotype was associated with a significantly increased risk for SGC (odds ratio 1.5, 95% confidence interval 1.0-2.3). Additionally, 13.9% of the SGC cases but only 8.4% of the controls were null for both genes and the results of the adjusted multivariable regression analysis suggested that having both null genotypes was significantly associated with an approximately 2-fold increased risk for SGC (odds ratio 1.9, 95% confidence interval 1.0-3.5). The presence of GSTT1 null genotype and the simultaneous presence of GSTM1 and GSTT1 null genotypes appear associated with significantly increased SGC risk. These findings warrant further study with larger sample sizes.

Transfer of human serum IgG to nonobese diabetic Igμnull mice reveals a role for autoantibodies in the loss of secretory function of exocrine tissues in Sjögren’s syndrome

The NOD (nonobese diabetic) mouse has been studied as an animal model for autoimmune insulin-dependent diabetes and Sjögren’s syndrome. NOD.Igμnull mice, which lack functional B lymphocytes, develop progressive histopathologic lesions of the submandibular and lachrymal glands similar to NOD mice, but in the absence of autoimmune insulitis and diabetes. Despite the focal appearance of T cells in salivary and lachrymal tissues, NOD.Igμnull mice fail to lose secretory function as determined by stimulation of the muscarinic/cholinergic receptor by the agonist pilocarpine, suggesting a role for B cell autoantibodies in mediating exocrine dryness. Infusion of purified serum IgG or F(ab′)2 fragments from parental NOD mice or human primary Sjögren’s syndrome patients, but not serum IgG from healthy controls, alters stimulated saliva production, an observation consistent with antibody binding to neural receptors. Furthermore, human patient IgG fractions competitively inhibited the binding of the muscarinic receptor agonist, [3H]quinuclidinyl benzilate, to salivary gland membranes. This autoantibody activity is lost after preadsorption with intact salivary cells. These findings indicate that autoantibodies play an important part in the functional impairment of secretory processes seen in connection with the autoimmune exocrinopathy of Sjögren’s syndrome.

Aging, retirement, and changes in physical activity : prospective cohort findings from the globe study

There is increased recognition that determinants of health should be investigated in a life-course perspective. Retirement is a major transition in the life course and offers opportunities for changes in physical activity that may improve health in the aging population. The authors examined the effect of retirement on changes in physical activity in the GLOBE Study, a prospective cohort study known by the Dutch acronym for "Health and Living Conditions of the Population of Eindhoven and surroundings," 1991–2004. They followed respondents (n = 971) by postal questionnaire who were employed and aged 40–65 years in 1991 for 13 years, after which they were still employed (n = 287) or had retired (n = 684). Physical activity included 1) work-related transportation, 2) sports participation, and 3) nonsports leisure-time physical activity. Multinomial logistic regression analyses indicated that retirement was associated with a significantly higher odds for a decline in physical activity from work-related transportation (odds ratio (OR) = 3.03, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.97, 4.65), adjusted for sex, age, marital status, chronic diseases, and education, compared with remaining employed. Retirement was not associated with an increase in sports participation (OR = 1.12, 95% CI: 0.71, 1.75) or nonsports leisure-time physical activity (OR = 0.80, 95% CI: 0.54, 1.19). In conclusion, retirement introduces a reduction in physical activity from work-related transportation that is not compensated for by an increase in sports participation or an increase in nonsports leisure-time physical activity.

Technology strategy : findings from adoption and adaptation of Japanese manufacturing management (JMM) to ASEAN and Australasian automotive manufacturers

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate the appropriateness of “Japanese Manufacturing Management” (JMM) strategies in the Asian, ASEAN and Australasian automotive sectors. Secondly, the study assessed JMM as a prompt, effective and efficient global manufacturing management practice for automotive manufacturing companies to learn; benchmark for best practice; acquire product and process innovation, and enhance their capabilities and capacities. In this study, the philosophies, systems and tools that have been adopted in various automotive manufacturing assembly plants and their tier 1 suppliers in the three Regions were examined. A number of top to middle managers in these companies were located in Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, Viet Nam, and Australia and were interviewed by using a qualitative methodology. The results confirmed that the six pillars of JMM (culture change, quality at shop floor, consensus, incremental continual improvement, benchmarking, and backward-forward integration) are key enablers to success in adopting JMM in both automotive and other manufacturing sectors in the three Regions. The analysis and on-site interviews identified a number of recommendations that were validated by the automotive manufacturing company’s managers as the most functional JMM strategies.

Australian national survey: preliminary findings

The National survey was the third phase in an ongoing initiative to identify critical success factors in ICT mediated supply chains. This study has been designed to harness the tacit and explicit knowledge to be found on the subject from the widest range of appropriate sources. At its core is the assumption that, provided with the fullest list of candidate success factors, a representative sample of experienced industry-based practitioners will (with the aid of statistical analysis) reveal a set of critical success factors. A postal survey has been judged to be the most appropriate mechanism for achieving this outcome.