Non-medical characteristics of primary healthcare centres (PHCs) influence the prescription of temporary disability leaves (incidence and absence rates) due to anxiety, as studied in the Valencian Community (E Spain; 5,111,706 inhabitants, 2009), where 485 centres (66%) were analysed. A structural two-equation model was used to explain which centres’ factors impact prescriptions more. This mode...

A. M. Airaksinen, S. K. Hekmatyar, N. Jerome, J-P. Niskanen, A. Pitkanen, R. A. Kauppinen, and O. Grohn Department of Neurobiology, A.I.Virtanen institute for Molecular Sciences, University of Kuopio, Kuopio, Finland, Dartmouth Medical School, Biomedical NMR Research Center, Hanover, New Hampshire, United States, Department of Physics, University of Kuopio, Kuopio, Finland, Department of Neurob...

We consider two group actions on m-tuples of n × n matrices. The first is simultaneous conjugation by GLn and the second is the left-right action of SLn × SLn. We give efficient algorithms to decide if the orbit closures of two points intersect. We also improve the known bounds for the degree of separating invariants in these cases.

Corporate governance theory predicts that leverage affects agency costs and thereby influences firm performance. We propose a new approach to test this theory using profit efficiency, or how close a firm’s profits are to the benchmark of a best-practice firm facing the same exogenous conditions. We are also the first to employ a simultaneous-equations model that accounts for reverse causality f...

This paper presents a survey of similarity-oriented metrics recently developed for use in addressing the group technology machine cell formation problem. This survey seeks to contribute to the theory underlying the group technology machine cell formation problem by identifying themes in the evolution of these metrics in terms of structural form, and in terms of the form and levels of the inform...

Personality undoubtedly plays a role in determining educational attainment and labor market outcomes. We investigate the role of self-esteem in determining wages directly and indirectly via education. We use data from the 1979 wave of the National Longitudinal Study of Youth (NLSY79) to estimate a three equation simultaneous equation model that treats self-esteem, educational attainment, and re...

This paper contributes to the literature on market disciplining of the sovereign governments in two ways: Firstly, it distinguishes the both sides of the market discipline hypothesis (MDH) by adopting three-stage least square estimation (3SLS) to incorporate the contemporaneous feedback effects between primary structural budget balances and country default risk premium. Secondly, by utilizing t...

Distributed acoustic target tracking is an important application area of wireless sensor networks. In this paper we use algebraic geometry to formally model 2-dimensional acoustic target tracking and then prove its best degree of required sensing coverage. We present the necessary conditions for three sensing coverage to accurately compute the spatio-temporal information of a target object. Sim...

The time-domain response of a three-dimensional (3-D) conducting object is modeled as an associate hermite (AH) series expansion. Using the isomorphism of the AH function and its Fourier transform, the frequency-domain response can be expressed as a scaled version of the time-domain expansion. Using early-time and low-frequency data, we demonstrate simultaneous expansion in both domains. This a...

Understanding the inherent structure of manipulative hand movements is a critical step toward automatic recognition of manipulative hand movements and toward automatic planning of natural movements for dexterous robots. Manipulative hand movements involve coordinated movements of the digits to manipulate an object within the hand, and are classified as either simultaneous or sequential. Simulta...