Enhancing a Delphi study on family-focused prevention

This article discusses how additional inquiries can enhance Delphi findings. We argue that inquiries aimed at supporting and refining Delphi findings is both theoretically and practically meaningful. We illustrate our argument on the basis of a framework for family-focused prevention that was developed through a Delphi study. The results of individual and group interviews conducted as a follow-up to the implementation of the framework provided us with effective ways to support and refine it. We draw the conclusion that adequate follow-up inquiries can enhance Delphi findings, from theoretical and application perspectives.     

A new approach to bad news effects on volatility: the multiple-sign-volume sensitive regime EGARCH model (MSV-EGARCH)

In this paper, using daily data for six major international stock market indexes and a modified EGARCH specification, the links between stock market returns, volatility and trading volume are investigated in a new nonlinear conditional variance framework with multiple regimes and volume effects. Volatility forecast comparisons, using the Harvey-Newbold test for multiple forecasts encompassing, seem to demonstrate that the MSV-EGARCH complex threshold structure is able to correctly fit GARCH-type dynamics of the series under study and dominates competing standard asymmetric models in several of the considered stock indexes.

A multiple perspectives view of the market case for green energy

This paper presents an exploratory evaluation of the market case for green energy. These energy sources are widely considered to have less of an ecological impact than conventional energy sources. The case for green energy is viewed from the multiple perspectives TOP (technical, organizational, personal) framework. The green energy technologies will need to meet certain technical, organizational and personal criteria and resolve key issues in order to address the barriers to market adoption. The multiple perspectives approach facilitates the evaluation of green-energy alternatives as potential new products which would enable organizations and individuals to meet both economic and green criteria that impact customer value creation. Given the present trends of increasing energy use and requirements to minimize environmental impact, green energy adoption may become a key element of strategies to ensure long-term economic growth.     

CEO建议寻求、关系学习与企业非连续创新: 公司创业导向的激活效应

在日益动态复杂不确定模糊的环境下,能否开发和实施非连续创新越来越事关企业生死存亡.然而,目前文献对企业非连续创新的研究多停留在理论探讨层面,对企业如何培育和顺利实现非连续创新还缺乏系统的考察.基于高阶理论和社会认知理论,从CEO建议寻求出发,探索CEO内部和外部两种建议寻求行为对企业非连续创新的影响,并重点引入关系学习作为中介来揭示CEO建议寻求对企业非连续创新的具体影响路径,并深入剖析公司创业导向对不同来源的CEO建议寻求作用路径的影响效应,继而构建企业非连续创新的过程机制模型.通过对 289 位CEO的问卷调研与深入分析发现:CEO内部建议寻求和外部建议寻求均是企业非连续创新的关键驱动因素;关系学习在CEO两种来源的建议寻求与企业非连续创新的关系中存在着部分中介作用;公司创业导向正向调节了关系学习在CEO内部建议寻求与企业非连续创新关系中的中介作用.研究结论对于深刻理解企业非连续创新的发生机制、CEO建议寻求利用、关系学习能力优化以及公司创业导向的打造均有着重要的指导价值.     

个性化需求预测支持系统研究

分析了构建个性化需求预测支持系统的必要性和个性化需求预测的特点,并拓展了个性化需求预测的概念。通过分析个性化需求预测支持系统的功能和要求,重点研究了个性化需求预测支持系统的结构组成,主要包括预处理部分、预测模型体系等。     

Ex ante forecasts of business-cycle turning points

This paper presents a logit model that accurately forecasts business-cycle turning points with a lead of one-quarter. The sample period consists of an initialization subset (1959:Q3–1975:Q4), and a subset for out-of-sample forecast evaluation (1976:Q1–2005:Q4). In contrast with the record of disappointing results in the literature, the model correctly forecasts all turning points in the test subset without forecasting recessions that did not occur.      

高职高专院校学生英语翻译能力培养的策略研究

从目前中国经济发展环境和现状对高职院校专业人才需要出发,提出了在高职院校提高学生翻译能力的必要性,进而提出了高职院校学生提高英语翻译能力的教学方法和对策。     

A critical assessment of existing estimates of US core inflation

Core inflation rates are widely calculated. The perceived benefit of core inflation rates is that they help to inform monetary policy. This is achieved by uncovering the underlying trend in inflation or by helping to forecast inflation. Studies which compare core inflation rates frequently assess candidate core rates on these two criteria. Using US data, the two standard tests of core inflation – the ability to track trend inflation and the ability to forecast inflation – are applied to a more comprehensive set of core inflation rates than has been the case in the literature to date. Furthermore, the tests are applied in a more rigorous fashion. A key difference in this paper is the inclusion of benchmarks to the tests, which is non-standard in the literature. Two problems with core inflation rates emerge. Firstly, it is very difficult to distinguish between different core rates according to these tests, as they tend to perform to a very similar level. Secondly, once the benchmarks are introduced to the tests, the core inflation rates fail to outperform the benchmarks. This failure suggests that core inflation rates are of less practical usefulness than previously thought.     

Foresight on biopharmaceuticals: Designing foresight methods for Spanish biopharmaceuticals

This paper has as its starting point the analysis of the systemic failures in the Spanish Biopharmaceutical Innovation System grounded in the study carried out by the same authors for the OECD between 2002 and 2004. Based on the evidence that one of the main failures is the lack of sufficient linkages between the different actors involved in the dynamic of the system, this paper proposes third-generation foresight as an instrument of science and innovation policy for resolving the problem of systemic failures. Foresight exercises could become an important instrument for reorienting policy, building new networks and linkages among the different actors, bringing new stakeholders into the strategic debate, exploring future opportunities for investment in science and innovation activities, etc. The objective of this paper is the design of a foresight exercise on biopharmaceuticals with the aim of solving, or at least reducing, the failures of this Spanish sectoral system of innovation and in consequence making it stronger.     

The information content of regional employment data for forecasting aggregate conditions

We consider whether disaggregated data enhance the efficiency of aggregate employment forecasts. We find that incorporating spatial interaction into a disaggregated forecasting model lowers the out-of-sample mean squared error from a univariate aggregate model by 70% at a two-year horizon.     

SEO领导风格对绩效影响的研究——基于创业导向视角的实证分析

近些年,采用创新方法解决社会问题的社会创业组织(SEO)不断在全球兴起,并引起国内外社会科学有关学者们的关注和研究兴趣.其中,社会创业组织领导风格对SEO价值创造过程以及绩效的影响问题成为重要的研究课题之一.目前,国外在这一方面的研究取得初步成效.但是,在中国,该方面的实际研究处于空白.本文研究试图对此做一些弥补:一方面以Covin和Slevin(1991)开发的量表为基础,再借鉴H.Morris(2011)对创新性、超前行动和风险承担在社会创业情境下的界定,对创业导向的测量题项进行了修订,以反映社会创业与传统创业相区别的特征;另一方面,选取中国开展社会创业一年以上的个体或非营利组织为研究对象与样本开展中国本土化的实证研究.本研究发现,变革型领导对创新、风险承担和超前行动三个变量具有积极影响,以及创新和超前行动与社会创业组织绩效具有正向关系.     

A case study of long-term Delphi accuracy

We evaluated the long-term accuracy of predictions from a Delphic poll of the future of the mental health profession [1]. Six hundred participants provided predictions about the likely occurrence and probable time courses for 18 scenarios that could possibly have occurred over the 30-year interval between 1981 to present. Each of the panelists was polled twice with distributional feedback from the first poll provided on the second poll questionnaires. The data from the second polling was used to make predictions regarding the future of various issues that may have affected the mental health profession over the forecast interval. It has now been 30 years since the original poll was conducted; the purpose of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of the original group predictions. Results indicated that the Delphi panelists correctly predicted the occurrence of 14/18 scenarios. For those scenarios that did occur, the time course predictions were accurate within approximately 1-5 years.     

On the estimation and forecasting of international migration: how relevant is heterogeneity across countries?

This paper performs a comparative analysis of estimation as well as of out-of-sample forecasting results of more than 20 estimators common in the panel data literature using the data on migration to Germany from 18 source countries in the period 1967–2001. Our results suggest that the choice of an estimation procedure has a substantial impact on the parameter estimates of the migration function. Out-of-sample forecasting results indicate the following: (1) the standard fixed effects estimators clearly outperforms the pooled OLS estimator, (2) both the fixed effects estimators and the hierarchical Bayes estimator exhibit the superior forecast performance, (3) the fixed effects estimators outperform GMM and other instrumental variables estimators, (4) forecasting performance of heterogenous estimators is mediocre in our data set.     

A vector error-correction forecasting model of the US economy

Any research or policy analysis in economics must be consistent with the time-series properties of observed macroeconomic data. Numerous previous studies reinforce the need to specify correctly a model’s multivariate stochastic structure. This paper discusses in detail the specification of a vector error correction forecasting model that is anchored by long-run equilibrium relationships suggested by economic theory. The model includes six variables––the CPI, the GDP price index, real money balances (M1), the federal funds rate, the yield on long-term (10-year) government bonds, and real GDP––and four cointegrating vectors. The accuracy of VECM model forecasts for individual, univariate time series during for the 1990s is comparable to forecasts made by government agencies and private forecasters, perhaps because many forecasters share a similar implicit, long-run steady-state growth model of the economy. Judged by multivariate statistics that account for forecast-error covariance, VECM forecasts are found to be somewhat more accurate than a naïve random-walk alternative.     

企业技术创新能力评价的指标与方法综述

对企业技术创新能力评价进行研究,有利于发现企业技术创新发展中的不足并提升其技术创新能力。文章从企业技术创新能力评价的指标体系设计原则、指标体系构建以及评价方法三个方面,对已有研究成果进行总结评论,以探讨仓业抟术创新能力评价研究中的问题及其发展趋势。     

Forecaster Overconfidence and Market Survey Performance

The authors document using the ZEW panel of German stock market forecasters that weak forecasters tend to be overconfident in the sense that they provide extreme forecasts and their confidence intervals are less likely to contain eventual realizations. They further show that moderate filters based on forecast accuracy of past performance over short rolling windows, which delicately balance ignoring relevant information and noise reduction, are somewhat successful in improving predictability. While poor performance can be due to various factors, a filter based on forecaster overconfidence, a prior tendency to have high forecast standard deviations, also improves the performance of market survey forecasts.     

Forecasting technology costs via the experience curve — Myth or magic?

To further understand the effectiveness of experience curves to forecast technology costs, a statistical analysis using historical data is carried out. Three hypotheses are tested using available datasets that together shed light on the historical ability of experience curves to forecast technology costs. The results indicate that the Single Factor Experience Curve is a useful forecasting model when errors are viewed in their log format. Practitioners should note that due to the convexity of the log curve a mean overestimation of potential cost reductions can arise as values are converted into monetary units. Time is also tested as an explanatory variable, however forecasts made with endogenous learning based on cumulative capacity as used in traditional experience curves are shown to be vastly superior. Furthermore the effectiveness of increasing weights for more recent data is tested using Weighted Least Squares with exponentially increasing weights. This results in forecasts that are less biased, though have increased spread when compared to Ordinary Least Squares.