Utility Theory for Home Abuse

The purpose of this study was to investigate this incongruity by examining the decision making patterns of angered and non-angered abusive men in a laboratory setting. Using Multi Attribute Utility Theory, a decision making model, the utility of abusive and nonabusive behaviors were compared among 32 mildly physically abusive men, 32 maritally distressed, nonabusive men, and 32 nondistressed, nonabusive men. All subjects were randomly assigned to an anger induction or neutral induction condition. As predicted, the utility for abusive behavior was greater for angry abusive men.
Deciding to be Violent: The Perceived Utility of Abusive Behavior in Marriage
Authors: Randall C. Nedegaard; AIR FORCE INST OF TECH WRIGHT-PATTERSONAFB OH

Utilities at home

This great article discusses how bargaining power can be used in order for households to make their utility functions equal. If both people included in the household do not have the same utility functions but are subject to the same budget and time constraint, the exisence of the household is under question.
I will not be able to go into details about the complications and the decision-making problems posed for each member of the household, neither to evaluate their utility curves. But the article shows how utility functions can actually be applied to real life to evaluate and bargain with your partners
http://www.jstor.org/sici?sici=0020-6598(198002)21%3A1%3C31%3AMAHDAB%3E2.0.CO;2-J&cookieSet=1

Top 10 least expensive vehicles to own

The cost of owning vehicle goes beyond its purchase price. Therefore in order to minimize that long-term cost various constraints have been imposed on the problem.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24260452/
The problem have been defined in the following way:
"All are 2008 base models. The manufacturer suggested retail price (MSRP) and ownership costs shown with each model apply only to the most basic version of the vehicle. That usually means it has a five-speed manual transmission. If you add equipment or move up trim levels, ownership costs typically increase accordingly.
Cost estimates are based on prices from March 2008. Interest expenses assume a five-year loan at current rates, with a 15 percent down payment. Opportunity costs consider what owners would have earned if car expenses were placed into certificates of deposit instead. Insurance costs are for a typical driver under age 65 with a clean record. Depreciation assumes the vehicle is disposed of in a private party transaction. To compute fuel costs, Vincentric used a five-month weighted pump-price average. Each model's five-year cost of fuel is calculated by using EPA fuel-economy ratings as published in the agency's 2008 Fuel Economy Guide."

Personal Radio or estimating individual utility curves?

Personal Radio gives you an insight into a user's entire profile. This station's content is built up based upon every song that the user gets scrobbled to their profile, via a plugin or the radio service.Anyone can listen to the personal radio of another user, however, to listen to your own radio station you'll need to subscribe.
The list of artists which you may see on an artist page as being "similar" is based exactly on our user's listening habits. If a lot of users listen to Artist X, but also Artist Y and Z - Y and Z artists will become similar to X.With a few added constants and other functions thrown into the equation to help make it more accurate, you'll find that's how Similar Artists are made.
http://www.last.fm/help/faq/

LATEST NFL DEPTH CHARTS

Example of scoring system for various palyers:

http://www.rotoworld.com/content/Depth_NFL.aspx?sport=NFL

The following diferent systems were used to calculate player standings:
TDO– Refers to the Scoring-Only System, where players get fantasy points only when they reach the end zone. Yardage is meaningless.
PPR – Stands for the Basic Scoring System but adds a point per reception. This scoring system rewards pass-catching Running Back and Recievers that can pile up the catches as well as yards.
FP – Refers to the Basic Scoring System below that rewards both scoring and yardage. This seems to be the standard most leagues use nowadays.
SOS – Stands for Strength of Schedule. This is the aggregated winning percentage of all the opponents on an NFL team’s schedule based on their last year’s winning percentage.
SOSFP – Stands for Strength of Schedule Fantasy Playoffs. This is the aggregated winning percentage of all the opponents from Week 14 through Week 17 (Fantasy Playoffs) on an NFL team’s schedule based on their last year’s winning percentage.

The best application of all these scoring methods has been selling them as cheat sheets as a premium service to interested customers.

Where to buy home in a recession

The link gives a map of the places to buy homes in 6 major USA cities. The suggestions are based on the expectations regarding the effect on the economy of these cities and data in the last 2 months.

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2008/real_estate/0804/gallery.best_buy_home.moneymag/3.html

Any decision-making process such as buying a home, involves besides taking personal factors in consideration to include macroeconomic criteria as well. Due to the recession in the house market, therefore the weights for the macroconomic criteria have become higher. The CNN article has evaluated the houses on one simple criteria: The 6 cities where home prices are likely to rise the most - or fall the least - in the next 12 months.