Sandwich analytics: A dataset comprising one year's weekly sales data correlated with crime, demographics, and weather.

Data collected from a quick-serve sandwich chain over one year provide an opportunity to study market, sociographic, meteorologic, and other factors impacting sales and sales forecasting. The weekly sales table contains over 79,000 rows which each represent summary statistics for the sales of an individual menu item in one store during one week of the year. The data were collected from the point-of-sale system of 10 stores. Secondary data regarding weather patterns, population, location, competition, and crime statistics were gathered and integrated with the original data set.

Lithium treatment of depressed and nondepressed alcoholics.

We assessed the efficacy of lithium carbonate in the treatment of 457 male alcoholics in a double-blind, placebo-controlled Department of Veterans Affairs Cooperative Study. Alcoholics either without depression or with a history of major depression, current major depression, or dysthymic disorder were studied. Two hundred eighty-six alcoholics without depression and 171 alcoholics with depression began the 52-week outpatient study; 172 alcoholics (60.1%) without depression and 108 alcoholics (63.2%) with depression completed the study. Among both all alcoholics who began the study and a subgroup who completed the study, no significant differences between alcoholics who took lithium and those who took placebo were found for the following outcome measures:number of alcoholics abstinent, number of days of drinking, number of alcohol-related hospitalizations, changes in rating of severity of alcoholism, and change in severity of depression. Similarly, no significant differences were found when only the 82 alcoholics compliant in taking lithium and the 89 alcoholics compliant in taking placebo were considered. In our study, lithium treatment did not affect the course of alcoholism in either depressed or nondepressed alcoholics.

Carcinogenicity and teratogenicity vs. psychogenicity: psychological characteristics associated with self-reported Agent Orange exposure among Vietnam combat veterans who seek treatment for substance abuse.

This study asked, "What are the psychological characteristics of Vietnam combat veterans who claim Agent Orange exposure when compared with combat-experienced cohorts who do not report such contamination?" The question was researched among 153 heroin addicts, polydrug abusers, and chronic alcoholics who were seeking treatment: 58 reported moderate to high defoliant exposure while in combat; 95 reported minimal to no exposure while in Vietnam. The null hypothesis was accepted for measures of childhood and present family social climate, premilitary backgrounds, reasons for seeking treatment, patterns and types of illicit drug and alcohol use, interpersonal problems, intellectual functioning, and short-term memory. The null hypothesis was rejected for personality differences, however, those who self-reported high Agent Orange exposure scored significantly higher on MMPI scales F, Hypochondriasis, Depression, Paranoia, Psychasthenia, Schizophrenia, Mania, and Social interoversion. The results suggest that clinicians carefully assess attributional processing of those who report traumatic experience.

Client correlates of community informant adjustment ratings.

Explored similarities and differences among home and community adjustment ratings by clients, community informants, and psychiatrists. Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventories, and Personality Adjustment and Role Skills (PARS) scales (Ellsworth, 1975) were administered to 169 consecutively-admitted psychiatric patients. Psychiatrists rated each client on the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scales and 141 community informants rated client's home and community adjustment on the PARS. Simple, multiple, and canonical correlational analyses were performed with scores from these tests. Although clients, community informants, and psychiatrists agree when rating clients' symptomatology, nevertheless each person highlighted different aspects of adjustment. Moreover, "impression management" (as measured by subtle-obvious MMPI scales) emerged as influential. These two findings suggest that outcome assessment must be based not only on ratings from multiple perspectives but also outcome assessment must entertain possible biases among raters. Supplementary analyses indicated that outcome assessment for psychiatric clients can be improved by adding response style scales which evaluate dimensions of "sick" and "healthy" symptom presentation and by identifying interaction of diagnosis with ratings of home and community and adjustment.

Psychological test comparison of day hospital an inpatient treatment.

Tested hypotheses, empirically generated from rating scales, which predicted that patients treated in partial, day hospital settings improve more in intellectual efficiency and social interaction than patients treated in full-time, inpatient settings. Thirty matched pairs of day hospital and inpatient volunteers were administered a group psychological test battery at the beginning of treatment and then 5 weeks later. The day hospital sample differed significantly on 7 of 24 pre- and posttest measures, the inpatient sample on 2. Gains occurred primarily in increased intellectual efficiency and social interaction. Multiple discriminant function analyses yielded no significant pretest differences, but posttest differences approached significance (p less than .06); day hospital patients registered increased Extraversion (Eysenck Personality Inventory).