A Bayesian Subset Analysis Of Sensory Evaluation Data

In social sciences it is easy to carry out sensory experiments using say a J-point hedonic scale. One major problem with the J-point hedonic scale is that a conversion from the category scales to numeric scores might not be sensible because the panelists generally view increments on the hedonic scale as psychologically unequal. In the current problem several products are rated by a set of panelists on the J-point hedonic scale. One objective is to select the best subset of products and to assess the quality of the products by estimating the mean and standard deviation response for the selected products. A priori information about which subset is the best is incorporated, and a stochastic ordering is modified to select the best subset of the products. The method introduced in this article is sampling based, and it uses Monte Carlo integration with rejection sampling. The methodology is applied to select the best set of entrees in a military ration, and then to estimate the probability of at least a neutral response for the judged best entrees. A comparison is made with the method, which converts the category scales to numeric scores

Evaluation of Right Here: A Young People's Mental Health Initiative of the Paul Hamlyn and Mental Health Foundations

Right Here was a five-year initiative of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation and the Mental Health Foundation that aimed to improve preventative and early intervention approaches to supporting the mental health and wellbeing of young people in the UK.The initiative ran from 2009 - 2014 and was delivered across four local sites: Brighton and Hove, the London Borough of Newham, Sheffield and Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. Itoffered a blend of activities to raise awareness of mental health and wellbeing; build confidence and resilience through physical, creative and therapeutic activities; influence policy and practice locally; and deliver products and services that had been developed by young people.A central Right Here team with responsibility for coordinating the initiative also convened a National Youth Panel to contribute to the initiative's governance and influencing agenda; arranged showcasing and dissemination opportunities for the projects' work; and provided consultancy support to the grantholders.Youth participation was critically important to the initiative; both local projects and the central team had a variety of ways of involving young people in the planning of activities, projects and the initiative as a whole. Partnership was also an informing principle at local and national level. The initiative sought to develop new insights around these areas

Small area estimation of general parameters with application to poverty indicators: A hierarchical Bayes approach

Poverty maps are used to aid important political decisions such as allocation of development funds by governments and international organizations. Those decisions should be based on the most accurate poverty figures. However, often reliable poverty figures are not available at fine geographical levels or for particular risk population subgroups due to the sample size limitation of current national surveys. These surveys cannot cover adequately all the desired areas or population subgroups and, therefore, models relating the different areas are needed to 'borrow strength" from area to area. In particular, the Spanish Survey on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) produces national poverty estimates but cannot provide poverty estimates by Spanish provinces due to the poor precision of direct estimates, which use only the province specific data. It also raises the ethical question of whether poverty is more severe for women than for men in a given province. We develop a hierarchical Bayes (HB) approach for poverty mapping in Spanish provinces by gender that overcomes the small province sample size problem of the SILC. The proposed approach has a wide scope of application because it can be used to estimate general nonlinear parameters. We use a Bayesian version of the nested error regression model in which Markov chain Monte Carlo procedures and the convergence monitoring therein are avoided. A simulation study reveals good frequentist properties of the HB approach. The resulting poverty maps indicate that poverty, both in frequency and intensity, is localized mostly in the southern and western provinces and it is more acute for women than for men in most of the provinces.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/13-AOAS702 the Annals of Applied Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aoas/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

Developing an effective regulatory framework for virtual currencies in Mauritius

It is widely accepted that virtual currencies have the potential of revolutionising the global finance sector. The potential of bitcoin has been recognised by corporate organisations and governments. With the continuing growth of bitcoin as a cryptocurrency, its regulatory regime has become crucial in determining the fate of this novel system of exchange. The global economic crisis and pandemic situation of 2020 is turning industries towards adoption of digital and virtual currencies. Although bitcoins have been regarded as the pioneer of decentralized peer to peer virtual currencies, there remains uncertainties in various countries as to whether they should embrace, devise new regulations or completely outlaw the digital currency. It has been recognised that Mauritius has the potential of acting as a Financial Technology (Fintech) hub for the African and surrounding regions through the rapid development and adoption of technology.For this to become possible, the current regulatory framework of Mauritius must be updated to reflect the continuing innovating changes in this area. So far, Mauritius has not yet implemented any specific regulations to address the use of Blockchain, bitcoins and cryptocurrencies in its jurisdiction. The only related legal framework currently being used in this area is the Regulatory Sandbox Licensing Scheme implemented by the Board of Investment Mauritius ("BOI"). It offers the possibility for investors to conduct their businesses in an area where there exists no legal framework or inadequate provisions under existing Mauritian legislation. In this research paper, the different regulatory frameworks of United States,Canada and China will be assessed to serve as a comparative analysis to examine the nature of their regulatory regimes.These jurisdictions have been chosen as they have been in the forefront of bringing significant regulatory changes, which has not been the case in any countries in Africa or Indian Ocean. These will be used to address the question as to whether there are any existing legal frameworks from other jurisdictions that can be customised or adapted for incorporation into the jurisdiction of Mauritius

Making Ethics Effective in Higher Education in Africa and Beyond: A Programme Led by a Visionary Leader, Prof. Obiora Ike

This article tracks the development of the Globethics.net Foundation’s work on ethics in higher education, mainly as a focus on the University administration and good practices. Ethics in university management and organisation is a center of focus since the new strategic focus of the Foundation in 2016, paying tribute to the leadership of Globethics.net Executive Director Obiora F. Ike.  Prof. Dr Ike pioneered the work and laid firm foundations for its continuation and global implementation. In addition to the Globethics.net resources of library, publications and online education through its academy, Globethics.net launched processes and tools to inspire and equip higher education institutions to reach true ethics excellence in their organisation as institutions