Summer activity patterns of nocturnal Scarabaeoidea (Coleoptera) of the southern tablelands of New South Wales

The purpose of this paper is to examine economic significance as a fourth measure of significance. In addition to describing and operationalising the concept of economic significance, a typology of economic significance indices is presented, including an example of how to compute these measures, as well as how to utilise them in applied research. We demonstrate how interventions that yield no statistical, practical or clinical effects may be economically significant. Economic significance is not only relevant in the majority of educational research studies, but also is more readily understood by policy makers and stakeholders than are the other three measures of significance, thereby facilitating the accountability of educational quality as a shared responsibility.

Is Investor Misreaction Economically Significant? Evidence from Short- and Long-term S&P 500 Index Options

Sensitivity to scope in nonmarket valuation refers to the property that people are willing to pay more for a higher quality or quantity of a nonmarket public good. Establishing significant scope sensitivity has been an important check of validity and a point of contention for decades in stated preference research, primarily in contingent valuation. Recently, researchers have begun to differentiate between statistical and economic significance. This paper contributes to this line of research by studying the significance of scope effects in discrete choice experiments (DCEs) using the scope elasticity of willingness to pay concept. We first formalize scope elasticity in a DCE context and relate it to economic significance. Next, we review a selection of DCE studies from the environmental valuation literature and derive their implied scope elasticity estimates. We find that scope sensitivity analysis as validity diagnostics is uncommon in the DCE literature and many studies assume unitary elastic scope sensitivity by employing a restrictive functional form in estimation. When more flexible specifications are employed, the tendency is towards inelastic scope sensitivity. Then, we apply the scope elasticity concept to primary DCE data on people’s preferences for expanding the production of renewable energy in Norway. We find that the estimated scope elasticities vary between 0.13 and 0.58, depending on the attribute analyzed, model specification, geographic subsample, and the unit of measurement for a key attribute. While there is no strict and universally applicable benchmark for determining whether scope effects are economically significant, we deem these estimates to be of an adequate and plausible order of magnitude. Implications of the results for future DCE research are provided.

The argali, Ovis ammon, a species of wild sheep, is threatened in Mongolia, suffering from poaching and competition with domestic livestock. The authors conducted ground and aerial surveys of argali in Dundgobi, Omnogobi and Dornogobi aimags (or provinces) of the South Gobi region of Mongolia. Ground surveys were conducted by vehicle and on foot, while aerial surveys were conducted using two Soviet AN-2 aircraft flying 40-km parallel transects. The interactive computer programme Distance was used to estimate population size and density. The authors observed a total of 423 argali in 85 groups (mean group size = 5.0 ± 0.6 SE), including 300 individuals in 61 groups on the ground survey (mean size = 4.9 ± 0.8 SE) and 123 animals in 24 groups during the aerial survey (mean size = 5.1 ± 1.2 SE). Population structure of the groups observed during the ground survey was 14.3 per cent males, 53.3 per cent females, 19.7 per cent lambs, and 12.7 per cent animals of undetermined sex (means = 0.7 ± 0.2 SE males, 2.6 ± 0.6 SE females, 1.0 ± 0.2 SE lambs, and 0.6 ± 0.4 SE undetermined). We estimated a population size of 3900 ± 1132 SE argali in the study area for a population density of 0.0187 ± 0.0054 SE animals/sq km. More rigorous and comprehensive surveys for argali, preferably for each distinct population, should be conducted for more accurate estimates. Argali require more active conservation and management, especially with respect to poaching and competition with domestic livestock. If sport hunting is to continue, a large portion of all money

Culicoides populations were sampled at two tidal stream localities near Brisbane (Tingalpa Creek and Boggy Creek), using light traps, a truck trap and human bait. Twenty‐three species of Culicoides were collected during two and a half years of field work.Species composition was comparable at both sites, with C. subimmaculatus Lee and Reye being the most abundant species. At Tingalpa Creek C. subimmaculatus formed 63% of light trap catches, 4% of truck trap catches and 99.7% of human bait catches. C. brevitarsis Kieffer (35%) and C. marmoratus (Skuse) (32%) predominated in truck trap collections.Females of all species were more abundant than males in light trap samples and in all but three of the more common species caught by the truck trap. All specimens collected from human bait were female. Seasonal variation in relative abundance of species was observed in light and truck trap samples.

This paper aims to investigate the ability of market‐based intermediary capital risk to predict the volatility of crude oil futures. Using shocks to the market‐based intermediary capital ratio (IC_RF) of primary dealers as a predictor, this paper shows that IC_RF exhibits statistically and economically significant predictive power for the volatilities of crude oil futures, from both in‐sample and out‐of‐sample perspectives. The revealed predictability is also of economic significance, because it enables examining of the performance of portfolios that are constructed on IC_RF‐based forecasts of oil volatility. Additionally, IC_RF contains robust predictive power beyond what is embedded in traditional fundamental variables. Further analysis provides solid evidence supporting the superiority of asymmetric and regime change models over linear specifications in forecasting oil realized volatility, and it only provides weak evidence for implied oil volatility.

Evaluating asset pricing anomalies: Evidence from Latin America

Amboseli National Park is regarded as one of the most economically significant parks owing to high tourist visitation and revenue streams. Despite the economic significance of Amboseli National Park, the wildlife dispersal areas outside the park boundaries are shrinking at an alarming rate due to changing land use activities and a growing human population pressure, aggravating human -wildlife conflicts as well as creating unviable ecosystem for wildlife. The park cannot support the current wildlife populations without the dispersal areas offered by the community land. The ecological limitation of the park calls for the management of wildlife resource in the ecosystem to be inclusive and involve the local communities. This study therefore aimed to provide these linkages and fill the existing gap by examining modalities for enhancing community participation in wildlife conservation in Amboseli Ecosystem informed by Social Exchange Theory and supported by the General Systems Theory.

Real exchange rates and real interest rate differentials: A present value interpretation

The golden hind grouper (Cephalopholis aurantia) is a visually striking reef fish of high economic value in the Coral Triangle region, serving both as a food source and as an ornamental species in the aquarium trade. In addition to its economic significance, C. aurantia plays an important ecological role in maintaining the balance of coral reef ecosystems. However, the species is facing serious threats due to increasing fishing pressure and exploitation, often carried out without strict regulatory oversight. Assessing genetic variation is thus essential for understanding population diversity and structure, enabling the development of effective conservation strategies, particularly under intensifying environmental and anthropogenic stress. In this study, we examined the genetic diversity and population structure of C. aurantia in the Spratly Islands using the mitochondrial Cytochrome c Oxidase subunit I (COI) gene. This gene is a widely recognized marker in population genetics of marine fish. A total of 30 individuals were successfully sequenced, and COI variability was assessed. Results revealed high haplotype diversity but low nucleotide diversity, indicating a genetic disequilibrium within the population. Neutrality tests and population dynamic analyses supported a scenario of post-bottleneck demographic expansion. Phylogenetic and haplotype network analyses further corroborated this hypothesis, showing a dominant haplotype with closely related satellite haplotypes, along with evidence of new haplotypes entering the population. Such patterns may be driven by larval dispersal capabilities, strong reproductive potential, and the influence of oceanic currents facilitating gene flow. Documenting signs of population expansion and immigration is crucial for spatially explicit management and conservation of C. aurantia, ensuring the long-term sustainability of this ecologically and economically significant species in the Spratly Islands.

Guo and Savickas [2005] show that aggregate stock market volatility and average idiosyncratic stock volatility jointly forecast stock returns. In this paper, we quantify the economic significance of their results from the perspective of a portfolio manager. That is, we evaluate the performance, e.g., the Sharpe ratio and Jensen's alpha, of a meanvariance manager who tries to time the market based on those two variables. We find that, over the period 1968-2004, the associated market-timing strategy outperforms the buy-and-hold strategy, and the difference is statistically and economically significant.

This paper examines evidence of predictability in Australian equities using both statistical and economic metrics of significance. A probit‐based predictive model is used to forecast the probability that the 1 month ahead excess market return will be positive. Funds under management are then switched between equities and fixed income on the basis of this forecast. Although the statistical evidence of the model's predictive ability is mixed, the results suggest convincing evidence of an economically significant degree of return predictability. A $A1 investment in the switching strategy (market) in January 1980 grows to over $A55 ($A39) by June 2007. Although the economic significance of the switching strategy remains even in the presence of high transaction costs, robustness checks suggest that the seemingly impressive full‐sample results might be sample specific. The apparent superiority of the portfolio‐switching strategy can be traced to a handful of observations early in the study during which the predictive model provides a timely signal to exit equities. There is little evidence that the predictive model has forecasting ability across the entire sample. As such, this paper serves both to illustrate how alternate metrics of return predictability can lead to divergent conclusions, and to emphasize the importance of subjecting apparent findings of predictability to robustness checks.

The Gawler Craton preserves a complex and prolonged tectonic history spanning the interval c. 3200-1500 Ma. Reworking of Paleoarchean, c. 3400-3250 Ma crust led to the formation of c. 3150 Ma granites now exposed within a narrow belt in the eastern Gawler Craton. Following this, there is no known record of significant tectonic activity until the onset of bimodal magmatism during the Neoarchean to earliest Paleoproterozoic, c. 2560-2470 Ma. This magmatism was terminated by high temperature metamorphism and deformation during the 2465-2410 Ma Sleafordian Orogeny. Magmatic events associated with widespread sedimentation over the interval c. 2000-1740 Ma largely sources this older crust. The c. 1730-1690 Ma Kimban Orogeny reworked these Paleoproterozoic basins and the Neoarchean basement in a pre-dominantly transpressional orogenic system. Juvenile mantle input followed by widespread crustal melting occurred over the interval c. 1620-1570 Ma. This period of intense magmatism initiated with emplacement of the relatively juvenile c. 1620-1608 Ma St Peter Suite. This was followed by the economically significant c. 1600-1570 Ma Gawler Range Volcanics/Hiltaba Suite magmatic event, which resulted from widespread mid-crustal melting. Synchronous deformation and high temperature metamorphism accompanied the Gawler Range Volcanics/Hiltaba Suite magmatic event indicating it occurred in an orogenic environment. Far field stress was distributed around a central core zone of largely undisturbed Gawler Range Volcanics with deformation localised in the northern and southern Gawler Craton. The Gawler Range Volcanics/Hiltaba Suite magmatic event resulted in formation of a province of major economic significance that includes the giant Olympic Dam Cu-Au-U ore body.

In this paper, we examine the net effect of several major tax changes in Australia on residential property prices. Specifically, we consider the announcement and introduction effects that resulted from several policy changes including the introduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and the accompanying First Home Owner Grant (FHOG). Using a large dataset of residential property sales in Melbourne, Australia, between 1992 and 2002 we estimate various models using parametric and non-parametric methods. While our parametric models suggest that the tax policy changes appear to have a statistically significant impact on house prices, no economically significant impact is detected by our non-parametric models, nor (upon closer inspection) by the parametric models themselves. Given the enormity of the sample size, this provides a telling example of the fundamental difference between statistical and economic significance and its implications for detecting government policy effectiveness.

The data of pest captured by light trap can be utilized to monitor pest attack in an area, so it can be determined early when the pest will attack that area. This research was conducted to determine the relationship of amount stem borer moths which captured by light trap with the attack intensity in field. The effectivity of light trap capture started on 7 pm until 10 pm. The highest population of stem borer moth were on 4 week after planted of plant (WAP) and decreased on the next week. The highest attack intensity were on 5 WAP (3,33%). The more population of stem borer moth which captured by light trap, the bigger percentage of attack intensity that happened in field with determination coeficiency is 0,789. Correlation coefficient (0.888) indicated a very strong relationship level. Keywords: stem borer, light trap, attack, effectivity, correlation.