Charmaine
Dean
Professor and Burnaby Mountain Research Chair
Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science
Simon Fraser University
British Colombia, Canada
"Spatial and Mixture Models for the
Analysis of Recurrent Events"
Abstract
Studies of recurring infection or chronic disease often collect
longitudinal data on the disease status of subjects. Two types of models
may be envisioned for the analysis of such data: counting process models
such as nonhomogeneous Poisson process models or multi-state
transitional models. This talk addresses both scenarios in the specific
case where the population consists of mixtures and where spatial
correlation is evident in the intensities governing recurrences.
A flexible semiparametric model for analyzing longitudinal panel count
data is presented. Panel count data refers here to count data on
recurrent events collected as the number of events which have occurred
within specific follow up periods. Discrete mixtures of smooth counting
process intensity forms are considered. These include mixtures of
adaptive splines which permit time-varying covariate effects, with the
so-called proportional intensity model as a limiting case. For recurrent
events handled in a multi-state transitional model framework,
individuals may be said to occupy one of a discrete
set of states and interest centers on the transition process between
states. This talk examines the use of mixed Markov models for the
analysis of such longitudinal data where the processes corresponding to
different subjects may be correlated spatially over a region. Both
discrete and continuous-time models incorporating spatially correlated
random effects are developed.
Several examples will illustrate the methods discussed including an
epidemiological study of revascularization intervention in the province
of Quebec, a forestry study of recurrent white pine weevil infestation
in British Columbia, and a biological study to assess the effectiveness
of a pheromone treatment in disturbing the mating habits of the cherry
bark tortrix moth.
Biography
Charmaine Dean is Professor and Burnaby
Mountain Research Chair in the Department of Statistics and Actuarial
Science at Simon Fraser University. Her research interest lies in the
development of methodology for the analysis of correlated count data
common in longitudinal and spatio-temporal analyses. Much of this work
has been motivated by direct applications to important practical
problems in biostatistics and ecology.
Dr. Dean is Past-President of the
Statistical Society of Canada, was 2002 President of the WNAR of the
International Biometrics Society, and has served as President of the
Biostatistics Section of the Statistical Society of Canada. She is
Associate Editor of Biometrics and of the Canadian Journal of
Statistics, and Senior Editor of Advances in Disease Surveillance.
She has served in governance at Simon
Fraser University in many capacities. She played a major role in
establishing the Faculty of Health Sciences in her capacity of Associate
Dean of that Faculty and previously in establishing the Department of
Statistics and Actuarial Science at Simon Fraser University; she became
the founding Chair of that Department in 2001. In 2003, Dr. Dean was
awarded the
CRM-SSC prize; in 2007 she was named Fellow of the American
Statistical Association; and in 2007 awarded the University of Waterloo
Alumni Achievement Medal.
Sharleen Forbes
Statistics New Zealand
"Trying to surf the education wave with official statistics"
Abstract
This paper discusses the role of a National Statistics Office in education and why we need to ‘pick the wave’ when we invest in statistics education. Targeted community groups currently include journalists, small businesses and Maori organisations but one of the major areas of investment is in training for state sector employees. This includes a Certificate of Official Statistics and a half-time professorship within the School of Government at Victoria University.
Another major area of investment is providing resources for schools that fit the new national Mathematics and Statistics Curriculum. This includes part funding of CensusAtSchools. Examples developed for classroom use are presented, using Statistics New Zealand’s Census and Survey data and also datasets specially constructed for school teachers (synthetic unit record files - SURFS).
Increased formal academic networks have also been created and the recent Vice-Chancellors’ agreement with Statistics New Zealand provides for free academic access to confidentialised official datasets for research and education purposes.
Biography
The mother of four adult children, I have worked at Statistics New Zealand
since 1994; first as Manager, Public Policy then as Chief Analyst, General
Manager, Strategic and Financial Services, General Manager, Statistical &
Methodological Services, and currently as General Manager, Statistical
Education & Research in conjunction with an Adjunct professorship in
Official Statistics at the School of Government, Victoria University,
Wellington, New Zealand. In the past I have worked as both a secondary
school mathematics teacher and university lecturer in mathematics and
statistics. I have a long-standing interest in mathematics education, in
the measurement of gender and ethnic differences in mathematics in
particular, and in the application of simple techniques to explain
longitudinal data.
For a number of years I convened a small collective of women (EIME – Equity
in Mathematics Education) that carried out several research projects and
published reports such as '‘Mathematics for All' (Forbes, Blithe, Clark
& Robinson 1990) and "The Testing of Girls in Mathematics" (Blithe, Clark,
Forbes & Forbes 1994). I have been a long-standing member of the
International Association of Women in Mathematics Education (IOWME), and an
active committee member of the New Zealand Statistical Association. I was
elected as President of this association from 1997-1999 and in 2001, I was
elected as the first New Zealand women member of the International
Statistics Institute (ISI).
In August 2000 I graduated with a PhD (done, in the main, extramurally from
Curtin University of Technology in Perth) on the topic of "Measuring
Students’ Education Outcomes: Sex and Ethnic Differences in Mathematics".
This led to me being asked to co-share a plenary session with Prof Gila
Hanna of Canada at the Mathematics Education into the 21st Century
conference in Jordan in November 2000, and to be the Bevan Werry Memorial
Speaker at the New Zealand Mathematics Association conference in 2001.
My current personal research outside the work place is surveying voluntary
organizations that hold meeting, but not membership, registers.
I am a keen tramper and mountain trekker having climbed Tapuae O Uenuku
(New Zealand), Mt Kosciuszko (Australia), Mt Kilimanjaro (Africa) and to
the base camp of Annapurna (Nepal). I also enjoy canoeing, biking,
gardening, science fantasy and family time.
