Are Decision-Making Styles, Locus of Control, and Average Grades in Exams Correlated with Procrastination in University Students?

In this paper decision-making styles, locus of control, and average grades in exams are examined as correlates of procrastination in a sample of 185 university students (mainly female students) recruited from mandatory courses for degrees in psychology and pedagogy at the University of Catania (Italy). Method: We used the Decisional Procrastination Scale (Ferrari, Johnson, & McCown, 1995), consisting of five Likert-type items useful for analyzing the procrastination; the Decision-Making Styles (Di Nuovo & Magnano, 2013), chosen for measuring the doubtfulness, delay, proxy, and no problem styles with 15 Likert-type items; the Locus of Control of Behavior Scale (Craig, Franklin, & Andrews, 1984) used to evaluate internal and external loci of control. The data were gathered through an online anonymous questionnaire and were analyzed using the multiple linear regression model to assess how styles of decision-making, locus of control, and average grades in exams affect the decision to procrastinate in university students. The main findings of this study indicate that doubtfulness and delay decision-making styles correlate with high decisional procrastination together with low average grades at university exams. Locus of control is excluded by the proposed model. Conclusions: These findings suggest pursuing a deeper investigation of the various types of procrastination and the measures used for analyzing the academic achievement in university students.

Dynamic Pricing Game in a Dual-channel Closed-loop Supply Chain with Heterogeneous Players and Delay Decision

In this paper, we study a dual-channel closed-loop supply chain(CLSC), where the manufacturer wholesales the new product through the traditional retail channel and distributes the remanufactured product via a direct channel established by himself. We focus on developing two dynamic Stackelberg game models under the assumption of the retailer is an adaptive agent and the manufacturer is a bounded rational player with non-delay and delay decisions. The existence and locally asymptotic stability of Nash equilibrium is investigated, and also the complex dynamics of each model is illustrated including period-doubling bifurcation, Neimark-Sacker bifurcation, strange attractor and chaotic phenomena. Numerical simulations are conducted to examine the impacts of key parameters on the complex behaviors of the long-run dynamic Stackelberg game and the performance of chain members under various scenarios. The results reveal that the excessively high value of the price adjustment speed of the manufacturer, the consumer discount perception for the remanufactured product as well as the consumer preference degree to the direct channel have adestabilization effect on the Nash equilibrium. Besides, the delay decision adopted by manufacturer no matter in the traditional or direct channel does not always necessarily make the system more stable, but the appropriately delay weights can expand the stability domain of the system. Moreover, the manufacturer would suffer a significant profit loss while the retailer can capture more profits when the dual-channel CLSC system falls into periodic cycles and chaos motions. At last, the variable feedback control method is utilized to eliminate the delayed system chaos.

Vicarious Trial-and-Error Is Enhanced During Deliberation in Human Virtual Navigation in a Translational Foraging Task

Foraging tasks provide valuable insights into decision-making as animals decide how to allocate limited resources (such as time). In rodents, vicarious trial-and-error (back and forth movements), or VTE, is an important behavioral measure of deliberation which is enhanced early in learning and when animals are presented with difficult decisions. Using new translational versions of a rodent foraging task (the “Movie Row” and “Candy Row”), humans navigated a virtual maze presented on standard computers to obtain rewards (either short videos or candy) offered after a variable delay. Decision latencies were longer when participants were presented with difficult offers, overrode their preferences, and when they accepted an offer after rejecting a previous offer. In these situations, humans showed VTE-like behavior, where they were more likely to pause and/or reorient one or more times before making a decision. Behavior on these tasks replicated previous results from the rodent foraging task (“Restaurant Row”) and a human version lacking a navigation component (“Web-Surf”) and revealed some species differences. Compared to survey measures of delay-discounting, willingness to wait for rewards in the foraging task was not related to willingness to wait for hypothetical rewards. And, smoking status (use of cigarettes or e-cigarettes) was associated with stronger discounting of hypothetical future rewards, but was not well-related to performance on the foraging tasks. In contrast, individuals with overweight or obese BMI (≥25) did not show stronger delay-discounting, but individuals with BMI ≥ 25, and especially females, showed reduced sensitivity to sunk-costs (where their decisions were less sensitive to irrecoverable investments of effort) and less deliberation when presented with difficult offers. These data indicate that VTE is a behavioral index of deliberation in humans, and further support the Movie and Candy Row as translational tools to study decision-making in humans with the potential to provide novel insights about decision-making that are relevant to public health.

Delay in decision and determinants for safe abortion among women at health facilities in south West Ethiopia: facility based cross sectional study

Background Delayed safe abortion is the most common cause of gynecologic admission in developing countries. The study, therefore, assessed the delay decision for safe abortion and determinant factors among women at health facilities in South West Ethiopia. Methods Facility-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 384 women who were selected from health facilities by using simple random sampling. A pre-tested structured questionnaire was used for data collection. Data were entered into Epidata and exported to SPSS for analysis. Binary Logistic regression was used and Variables with P-value < 0.25 during bivariate analysis were included in the multivariable logistic regression model. Finally, variables with p-value ≤0.05 were judged as a statistically significant association. Results The magnitude of delay decision for safe abortion services was 70.8% (0.66, 075). Place of residence [AOR 2.44 (95% C.I: (1.39, 4.30)], lack of formal education [AOR: 2.41 (95% C.I:(1.08, 3.59)], level of education [AOR: 2.22 (95% C.I: (1.19, 4.11)], history of previous abortion [AOR: 3.47 (95% C.I: (1.74, 8.6.91)] and late confirmation of pregnancy [AOR: 1.64 (95% C.I: (1.01–2.65)] were the determinant factors for delay in decision for safe abortion. Conclusion This study revealed that the majority of women were delayed for the decision of safe abortion services. Place of residence of the women, lack of formal education, history of previous abortion and late confirmation of pregnancy were the determinant factors for women’s decision for safe abortion. Therefore, it is better to work on awareness creation the timing of safe abortion and complication of delay abortion especially for the women from rural area.

An Novel Image Recognition method based on Three-way Decision

The traditional recognition method takes the low-level information of the image as the foundation. The image recognition center of gravity is biased towards the typical features, and achieves the effect of recognition by region-dependent segmentation. Because the general image segmentation is a regular rectangle, easily lead to the same target is divided into different sub-blocks, ignoring the image of the fuzzy part, so the image recognition is not complete. An image recognition algorithm based on threeway decision is proposed. It takes full advantage of effective information in the image, improving the image recognition accuracy. First, this method divided the image into three regions: positive region, negative region and delay decision region. Second, an iterative process is performed on the region of the delay decision. Final, image recognition is performed on the positive sample region. Based on the basic theory of the three-way decision, the more obvious the decision result is, the more iterations are, and the information is added to the classifier until the blurred part of image cannot be divided. Finally, to achieve the realize effective image recognition. This method simulates the process of human cognition effectively, and makes the utilization of the effective information reach the maximum in the recognition process. The results of the experimental analysis showed that the method is more concise and efficient, and the recognition accuracy is more accurate.

Kuczynski ouster would rock Peru political stability

Significance Kuczynski’s future as president hangs in the balance. His refusal to heed opposition demands for his resignation may harden the resolve of a congressional majority to vote for his ouster on grounds of ‘moral incapacity’. Kuczynski, who will face his parliamentary accusers on December 21, is embroiled in controversy as to whether he received funds from Brazilian construction company Odebrecht when a minister. Impacts Kuczynski’s removal would probably lead to a downgrade in Peru’s credit rating. It would delay decision-making, but not necessarily herald a shift in economic policy. The hiatus would have a further negative impact on institutional stability. The main beneficiary, at least in the short term, would be Keiko Fujimori.

Dynamic Game Behavior of Retailers Considering the Quality of Substitute Products Based on Delay Decision

Motivated by the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road project, i.e. the Belt and Road (B&R), more goods will flow around the world. With this trading platform, people can buy products at relatively cheap prices, and it is easier for people to buy various goods. The quality and quantity of products thus attract more and more attention in the supply chains. This paper discusses the quantity decision by considering the product quality in parallel supply chains where two manufacturers produce substitute products and then sell them to their downstream retailers separately. In terms of the changing quantity, as well as the different quality, this paper establishes a dynamic game model to explore the dynamic behavior when the optimal profits of two retailers have been calculated. The dynamic behaviors of the system, such as stable region, bifurcation and chaos, strange attractors and the largest Lyapunov exponents (LLE) are analyzed. The effect of the quantity adjustment parameter on the stability of the supply chain system is investigated through numerical simulations. Furthermore, a dynamic game model is established based on the quality delay decision, to investigate the influence of the quality delay parameter on the dynamic game model and the profits. Finally, the optimal decisions are obtained and analyzed.

Computation of the Stability and Complexity about Triopoly Price Game Model with Delay Decision

We develop the price game model based on the entropy theory and chaos theory, considering the three enterprises are bounded rationality and using the cost function under the resource constraints; that is, the yield increase will bring increased costs. The enterprises of new model adopt the delay decision with the delay parameters τ1 and τ2, respectively. According to the change of delay parameters τ1 and τ2, the bifurcation, stability, and chaos of the system are discussed, and the change of entropy when the system is far away from equilibrium is considered. Prices and profits are found to lose stability and the evolution of the system tends to the equilibrium state of maximum entropy. And it has a big fluctuation with the increase of τ1 and τ2. In the end, the chaos is controlled effectively. The entropy of the system decreases, and the interior reverts to order. The results of this study are of great significance for avoiding the chaos when the enterprises make price decisions.