The Effects of Food Deserts on the Weight Status of South Dakota Children.

INTRODUCTION: Childhood obesity continues to be a public health issue in the U.S. Research prior to this study demonstrated that children living on food deserts (FD) had greater weight statuses than children who did not live on FDs. Based on U.S. Department of Agriculture classification, almost half of the state of South Dakota is classified as a food desert, and childhood obesity continues to be an issue in the state. The purpose of this study was to determine if FDs play a role in childhood obesity in South Dakota, more specifically whether South Dakota children who live on FDs or on the border of FDs have greater weight statuses than children who live on non-FDs. METHODS: School height and weight data collected by the South Dakota Department of Health was used to calculate weight status for students in six schools; weight was categorized as underweight, healthy weight, overweight, and obese. RESULTS: It was discovered that the pair of border-FD areas had the lowest total percentage of students who were classified as obese while the non-FD areas had the highest percentage of students who were classified as obese. The FD areas fell in between the aforementioned areas. CONCLUSIONS: By utilizing this research and identifying precursors for obesity, such as where an individual lives and their access to healthy food, health care leaders and their multidisciplinary team can help facilitate community interventions that target areas most impacted by childhood obesity.

Trends in and contributions to entrepreneurship research: a broad review of literature from 1996 to June 2012.

This article, which began as an effort to gauge trends in and contributions to the broad field of "entrepreneur/entrepreneurship," reviews 5,476 academic articles on entrepreneurship that were published in 522 Social Sciences Citation Index and Science Citation Index journals from 1996 to June 2012. This survey identifies keywords and conducts a review to search for and identify related articles in the Institute for Scientific Information Web of Science database. We then present our findings, including the number of publications by year, categorization of article types, main academic journals, authors, and most-cited articles. The citation counts for authors, journals, and articles are also analyzed. This study indicates that the number of articles related to the keyword entrepreneur increased from 1996 to the end of 2011, which is a sign of an upward trend in the influence of entrepreneurs. Entrepreneur research fascinated numerous scholars during the study period covering 16.5 years. In particular, researchers from the USA, England, Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands have made the most contributions to this field. This literature review provides evidence that the concept of entrepreneur attracted academic researchers, resulting in significant contributions to the field of entrepreneur research.

Brand switching or reduced consumption? A study of how cigarette taxes affect tobacco consumption.

We examined the influence of cigarette taxes on tobacco consumption, with an emphasis on smokers' choice between reducing cigarette consumption and switching brands. We constructed three scenario-based models to study the following two subjects: (1) the relationship between deciding whether to reduce one's cigarette consumption and to practice brand switching (simultaneous or sequential); (2) the key determinants that affect smokers' decisions in terms of their consumption and brand switching when facing higher taxes. We applied data collected from a survey in Taiwan, and the results indicated that both independent and two-stage decision-making models generated very similar conclusions. We also found that gender difference contributed to reduce cigarette consumption. In addition, this study indicated that high-income smokers were less likely to switch brands, whereas well-educated smokers were more likely to switch brands. Most importantly, we questioned the effectiveness of cigarette tax policy, as our results suggested that higher price did not necessarily reduce consumption. Indeed, data indicated that <24 % of smokers actually reduced their cigarette consumption after the tax on cigarettes increased.

Re-examining the price sensitivity of demand for cigarettes with quantile regression.

Existing studies suggest that teenagers, young adults, and individuals of low socioeconomic status are more sensitive to changes in cigarette prices. However, little is known as to whether there are differences in price sensitivity between heavy and light smokers. To examine this gap, the present study uses quantile regression to estimate price sensitivity of demand for smokers with different levels of tobacco consumption. We conducted a national personal interview survey in Taiwan and the results showed price sensitivity is positively associated with the level of cigarette consumption. The data indicate that pricing strategies are more likely to notably reduce cigarette consumption for heavy smokers. Our findings suggest policymakers can meet target control for cigarette consumption by effectively adjusting market prices of cigarettes.

Health risk perception and betel chewing behavior--the evidence from Taiwan.

In this study, we provided an empirical examination of the interaction between people's health risk perception and betel chewing. We hypothesized that a better knowledge of possible health risks would reduce both the number of individuals who currently chew betel and the likelihood of those who do not yet chew betel to begin the habit. We constructed a simultaneous equation model with Bayesian two-stage approach to control the endogeneity between betel chewing and risk perception. Using a national survey of 26,684 observations in Taiwan, our study results indicated that better health knowledge reduced the possibility that people would become betel chewers. We also found that, in general, betel chewers have a poorer health risk perception than other population. Overall, the empirical evidence suggested that health authorities could reduce the odds of people becoming betel chewers by improving their knowledge of betel-chewing's harmful effects.

Shell of abalone Haliotis diversicolor supertexta can eliminate waterborne zinc biokinetically.

Dietary and nondietary accumulation of waterborne zinc (Zn) by shell of abalone Haliotis diversicolor supertexta was studied to determine if abalone shell can accumulate and eliminate Zn biokinetically. Shell of H. diversicolor supertexta rapidly accumulated Zn at microgram per gram concentrations during a 7-d uptake period for dietary and nondietary exposure to 1 microgml(-1) Zn seawater. Depuration half-lives were 7.22 and 15.40 d for dietary and nondietary exposure, respectively. The uptake rate constants were 5.12 and 4.84 ml g(-1)d(-1), respectively, for dietary and nondietary exposure. The depuration rate constants were 0.048 and 0.10 d(-1), respectively for dietary and nondietary exposure. Results from this study showed that the shell of H. diversicolor supertexta accumulated Zn and that it reflected the composition of the seawater in which the abalone lived. This suggested that the shell of H. diversicolor supertexta can be used as a bioindicator or can act as a receptor to biokinetically eliminate heavy metals from aquatic food webs.