Calibrated Bayes Factors Should Not Be Used: A Reply to Hoijtink,van Kooten,and Hulsker

Hoijtink, Kooten, and Hulsker (2016 Hoijtink, H., van Kooten, P., &; Hulsker, K. (2016). Why Bayesian psychologists should change the way they use the Bayes factor. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 51, 1--9. doi: 10.1080/00273171.2014.969364.[Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) present a method for choosing the prior distribution for an analysis with Bayes factor that is based on controlling error rates, which they advocate as an alternative to our more subjective methods (Morey &; Rouder, 2014 Morey, R.D., &; Rouder, J.N. (2014). Bayesfactor: Computation of Bayes factors for common designs. R package version 0.9.9. Retrieved from http://CRAN.R-project.org/package=BayesFactor [Google Scholar]; Rouder, Speckman, Sun, Morey, &; Iverson, 2009 Rouder, J.N., Speckman, P.L., Sun, D., Morey, R.D., &; Iverson, G. (2009). Bayesian t-tests for accepting and rejecting the null hypothesis. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 16, 225–237. doi: 10.3758/PBR.16.2.225[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Wagenmakers, Wetzels, Borsboom, &; van der Maas, 2011 Wagenmakers, E.-J., Wetzels, R., Borsboom, D., &; van der Maas, H. (2011). Why psychologists must change the way they analyze their data: The case of psi. A comment on Bem (2011). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 100, 426–432. doi: 10.1037/a0022790[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). We show that the method they advocate amounts to a simple significance test, and that the resulting Bayes factors are not interpretable. Additionally, their method fails in common circumstances, and has the potential to yield arbitrarily high Type II error rates. After critiquing their method, we outline the position on subjectivity that underlies our advocacy of Bayes factors.     

Treatment of Patients with Advanced Hepatocellular Carcinoma using Stem Cell Differentiation Stage Factors

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) represents the third leading cause of cancer-related death. Because HCC is multicentric with time, excluding the few transplanted patients, sooner or later it becomes untreatable with loco-regional therapies and, until some years ago, it was not responsive to systemic therapies. In 2005 a randomized trial indicated the efficacy of a product containing stem cell differentiation stage factors (SCDSF) taken from zebrafish embryos during the stage in which the totipotent stem cells are differentiating into the pluripotent adult stem cells. In such a trial the patients, with “intermediate” and “advanced” HCC according to Barcelona Clinic Liver Cancer/American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (BCLC/AASLD) guidelines, presented benefit in terms of performance status and objective tumoral response, with some cases (2.4%) of complete response, that is, sustained disappearance of the neoplastic areas or blood supply therein, accompanied by normalization of alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) levels (complete response [CR]). A second study reporting the experience of a tertiary referral center on patients with “advanced” stage confirmed the possibility to obtain CR. Out of 38 patients, 5 presented a sustained CR (13.1%). Improvement on PS was obtained in 17 patients (34.6%). No side effects occurred.     

Who,where, when: the demographic and geographic distribution of bicycle crashes in West Yorkshire

Factors associated with cycle safety, including international differences in injury and mortality rates, protective equipment and bicycle training, have been subject to increasing academic interest. Environmental variables associated with cycle safety have also been scrutinised, but few studies have focussed on geographical factors at the local level. This paper addresses this research gap by analysing a geo-referenced dataset of road traffic incidents, taken from the UK’s STATS19 dataset (2005–2012). We investigate incidents involving cyclists within West Yorkshire. This is an interesting case study area as it has an historically low cycling rate but very ambitions cycling plans following investment from the Department of Transport. West Yorkshire is found to be an unusually risky area for cyclists, with an estimated 53 deaths and 1372 serious injuries per billion kilometres cycled, based on census commuting statistics. This is roughly double the national average. This riskiness varies spatially and temporally, broadly in line with expectations from the previous literature. An unexpected result was that cycling seems to be disproportionately risky for young people in West Yorkshire compared with young people nationally. The case study raises the issue of potential negative health impacts of promoting cycling amongst vulnerable groups in dangerous areas. We conclude by highlighting opportunities for increasing cycling uptake via measures designed primarily to improve safety. The analysis underlying this research is reproducible, based on code stored at github.com/Robinlovelace/bikeR.     

神经性厌食症的生物-心理-社会模型

厌食症作为一种精神和躯体疾病严重危害个体健康。已有众多研究者从生物-心理-社会整体医学模型角度对厌食症进行了研究。厌食行为受到遗传基因易感性、中枢神经递质活性改变、人格特质、肥胖恐惧感、应激因素、"瘦"文化背景、家庭关系紊乱等的影响。未来应着力探讨神经内分泌与厌食症的因果关系并加强厌食症的预防、干预及治疗。     

Connaissances et contrôle exécutif : deux facteurs cognitifs de protection contre le vieillissement de la mémoire épisodique ?

In this study we refer to Craik and Bialystok's model distinguishing the “knowledge” (cultural learning experience that forms the basis for knowledge of the world) and the “executive control” (set of operations that control and regulate cognitive performance) as two main factors susceptible accounting for the age-related negative effects on the cognitive functioning, and for a possible age-related protective effect. Thus, the aim of the present study was to examine the possible protective effect of these two factors on the age-related decline in a cued-recall task. Four age groups of participants (20–39 years, 40–59 years, 60–74 years and 75–90 years) were administered with a word-stem cued-recall test to assess episodic memory, a “vocabulary” sub-test of the WAIS-R to assess knowledge and a reading span test to assess control. Results showed an age-related effect on the episodic memory, the control performance and the knowledge measure, indicating that performance decreases with age. A GLM analysis revealed a positive effect of the knowledge and the control factors on the cued-recall performance, and interaction between age and the knowledge factor resulting from a positive effect of the knowledge level only for the youngest group of participants (20–39 years). Furthermore, results revealed an interaction between age and the control factor, indicating a positive effect of the control level for the two oldest groups of participants (60–74 years and 75–90 years). These results suggest that, contrary to the knowledge, the control factor could be an effective protection against the age-related negative effects on the episodic memory.     

Trust and Involvement as Higher-Order Factors of General Attitudes Towards Politics. Testing a Structural Model Across 26 Democracies

Interindividual differences in how people think and feel about politics have been investigated for decades. However, the great number of attitudinal concepts that has been developed to describe these differences is likely to distract from their conceptual overlap and dimensional structure. In addition, not much is known about the cross-cultural invariance of their interrelation. We propose that attitudes towards politics can be structured by two broad higher-order factors, a factor of general political involvement and a factor of general political trust. In two studies (N₁ = 767; N₂ = 29,018), including representative samples from 26 democracies, we first conduct several confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) to show that the higher-order model is a well-fitting and parsimonious alternative to a baseline model without higher-order factors in most samples. Second, we present evidence from multigroup CFA that the overall patterns of factor loadings are the same across all 26 countries. We interpret this structural equivalence across different democracies as support for the assumption that general political involvement and general political trust reflect basic orientations towards politics that are based on (1) demands of democratic political systems and (2) universal principles in human trait structure.     

青少年抑郁:基于社会支持的视角

青少年罹患抑郁的社会因素受到研究者们的密切关注,尤其是社会支持因素。本文首先总结了社会支持与青少年抑郁关系的内在机制,包括主效应机制和缓冲效应机制;其次论述了影响社会支持与青少年抑郁关系的多种因素,主要涉及来自于社会支持提供者、社会支持接受者和测量方法等方面的因素。社会支持提供者因素包括性别、数量和社会地位;社会支持接受者因素包括性别、年龄、个体内在特征、人格特征以及遗传;此外方法主要涉及社会支持与抑郁症的测量。最后提出了未来的研究方向,如测量方法的改进、元分析纵向研究的开展、线上支持的研究,为青少年抑郁的社会干预提供更多的研究视角。     

Should older people be considered a homogeneous group when interacting with level 3 automated vehicles?

Exploring the future mobility of older people is imperative for maintaining wellbeing and quality of life in an ageing society. The forthcoming level 3 automated vehicle may potentially benefit older people. In a level 3 automated vehicle, the driver can be completely disengaged from driving while, under some circumstances, being expected to take over the control occasionally. Existing research into older people and level 3 automated vehicles considers older people to be a homogeneous group, but it is not clear if different sub-groups of old people have different performance and perceptions when interacting with automated vehicles. To fill this research gap, a driving simulator investigation was conducted. We adopted a between-subjects experimental design with subgroup of old age as the independent variable. The differences in performance, behaviour, and perception towards level 3 automated vehicles between the younger old group (60–69 years old) and older old group (70 years old and over) was investigated. 15 subjects from the younger old group (mean age = 64.87 years, SD = 3.46 years) and 24 from the older old group (mean age = 75.13 years, SD = 3.35 years) participated in the study. The findings indicate that older people should not be regarded as a homogeneous group when interacting with automated vehicle. Compared to the younger old people, the older old people took over the control of the vehicle more slowly, and their takeover was less stable and more critical. However, both groups exhibited positive perceptions towards level 3 automation, and the of older old people’s perceptions were significantly more positive. This study demonstrated the importance of recognising older people as a heterogeneous group in terms of their performance, capabilities, needs and requirements when interacting with automated vehicles. This may have implications in the design of such systems and also understanding the market for autonomous mobility.     

直升机教养的内涵、影响和后效

直升机教养是父母对始成年期青少年普遍采用的一种教养方式,它是指父母给孩子过度的支持,较多地控制其行为,并不能给予孩子适合其年龄的自主权的教养方式。本文从直升机教养的概念辨析、影响因素和作用后效方面进行了系统梳理和整合分析,未来研究需要扩展研究对象和内容、精细探讨直升机教养的作用机制、重视我国始成年人的直升机教养,深入考察直升机教养与健康成长的因果关系。