Shear forming is a versatile process for manufacturing complex lightweight components which are required in increasing numbers by many different industries. Inherent advantages of the process are simple tooling, low tool costs, good external and internal surface quality, close dimensional...

In this paper we describe a computer intensive method to find the ridge parameter in a prediction oriented linear model. With the help of a factorial experimental design the method is tested and compared to a classical one.

We evaluate the effectiveness of sending text messages to pregnant women containing appointment reminders and suggestions for healthy behaviors during pregnancy. Receiving messages had an overall positive effect of 5 percent on the number of prenatal care visits attended. Moreover, for women who...

This paper studies the effects of information and communication technologies (ICT) in the school environment on educational achievement. To quantify these effects, the impact is evaluated of a project run by the municipality of Guayaquil, Ecuador, which provides computer-aided instruction in...

The recent financial crisis has initiated pressures for not only policy reform but also fundamental institutional fiscal reforms. This paper explores the connection between economic crises and fiscal institutional reforms in a region that has experienced plenty of both in recent years, namely...

We present evidence from a laboratory experiment showing that individuals who believe they were treated unfairly in an interaction with another person are more likely to cheat in a subsequent unrelated game. Specifically, subjects first participated in a dictator game. They then flipped a coin...

A large number of recent experimental studies show that women are less likely to sort into competitive environments. While part of this effect may be explained by gender differences in risk attitudes and overconfidence, previous studies have attributed the majority of the gender gap to gender...

This contribution defines an instance generator for capacitated, dynamic, multi-level lot sizing problems. It provides sophisticated methods for generating systematically varied parameter level combinations automatically. This helps to perform evaluations of lot sizing methods according to a...

Background: Experimental designs constitute a vital component of all Stated Choice (aka discrete choice experiment) studies. However, there exists limited empirical evaluation of the statistical benefits of Stated Choice (SC) experimental designs that employ non-zero prior estimates in...

A growing number of school districts use centralized assignment mechanisms to allocate school seats in a manner that reflects student preferences and school priorities. Many of these assignment schemes use lotteries to ration seats when schools are oversubscribed. The resulting random assignment...