Kyriakos Drivas

Health literacy among university students in Greece: determinants and association with self-perceived health, health behaviours and health risks

BackgroundHealth literacy is widely considered as a key determinant of health and a priority in the public health policy agenda. Low health literacy has been associated with poorer health states, broader inequalities and higher health systems’ costs. In the present study we bring into focus the functional health literacy among university students in Greece, researching and assessing mainly their ability to apply basic knowledge in a health context.MethodsThe study was carried out during the period 15–30 April 2013, among a random sample of 1,526 students of 14 Higher Tertiary Public universities and Technological Educational Institutes in Greece. The objective of the study was to assess the functional health literacy among university students in Greece, adopting the short four-item comprehension test of Bostock and Steptoe. Summary statistics, correlations and regressions were used to assess the determinants of health literacy and the association with self-perceived health, health behaviours and health risks.ResultsEconomic factors, such as family income, demographic factors, such as gender, and health behaviours and risks, namely consumption of alcohol, smoking and physical workout are associated with the level of health literacy and health status of the participant. While the results of the study are consistent with previous work in this area, several findings worth further research.ConclusionsThough, health promotion interventions in Greece include health literacy as one of the basic pillars of the public health policy agenda, it is clear, that health literacy needs to become a key policy issue in Greece, mainly focusing in young ages, where healthy (or unhealthy) behaviours are established affecting the health through the life span.

Research funding and academic output: evidence from the Agricultural University of Athens

This paper uses detailed data on funding information and research output from the Agricultural University of Athens to examine how each type of funding source is related to the quantity and quality of academic research output. Of special interest are private, Greek government and European Union sources of funding. We find that after controlling for unobserved heterogeneity from each research laboratory, all types of research funding are similarly related to both the count of publications and citations. Further, we find that research laboratories that have filed for at least one patent application produce more publications and citations to their work, indicating that laboratories that are close to industry are also engaged actively in research.

Government sponsorship and nature of patenting activity of US universities and corporations

This paper studies the relationship between government sponsorship and nature of innovation produced by US universities and corporations. Using detailed patent data information and, in particular, from the patent document wrapper, where the applicant is obliged to disclose any federal support, we examine whether (i) federally funded patented innovations are more basic than their non-federally funded peers, and (ii) federally funded corporate and university patented innovations are very different from their existed research agenda. Our results strongly support that federally funded corporate patents are more basic in nature, while the evidence for universities is less nuanced. Also less pronounced and conclusive are the findings about university patented inventions and their ties to universitys own research agenda. Results, however, may vary depending on university (corporation) size. While the federal government finances high-risk basic projects, it appears that some firms do not incorporate them in their overall research portfolio.

Production of output and ideas: efficiency and growth patterns in the United States

ABSTRACT Production of output and ideas: efficiency and growth patterns in the United States. Regional Studies. This paper examines efficiency and growth patterns in the production of output and ideas in the United States. It employs frontier techniques and jointly estimates the production of output and the production of ideas. We find states to be particularly efficient in the use of their inputs in the production of output process, whereas there is more waste in the use of innovation resources to produce new knowledge. The results do not lend support to the common perception that richer (more innovative) states are more efficient than less rich (less innovative) states for every dollar spent.

Using the Patent Term Changes in Assessing the Evolution of Patent Valuation from Filing to Maturity

Patents, or literae patentae (open grants) as originally known, are public documents that disclose the particulars of an innovation. In terms of a territorial metaphor, one can think of patents as property deeds that demarcate a technological territory. Such demarcation allows for frictionless tech-transfer because licensor and licensee have at hand a chart of the technology. When too many patents accumulate, as is the present case of affairs, the technology’s borders can become foggy because numerous neighbouring patentees may own overlapping technologies. So what was once a technology with a clearly attached value to it becomes an uncertain asset, in which case tech-transfer is plagued by higher transaction costs as only courts can demarcate the innovation’s borders. Effectively what was assumed as an open grant can become a quasi literac clausae (close grant) until such demarcation takes place. How to avoid such conversion has stirred up a policy debate on how to evade patent overpopulation; see Correa (2014). Since policy makers must have an appreciation of the usefulness of patents as RD a free lunch no doubt.1 Thus, in the latter case, the present value of a possible tenure extension (of a few weeks/months) must be harder to pinpoint in advance. An innovator who is constrained in terms of her patent filing volume (and must prioritise her patenting) should be inclined to file the patents considered as more valuable first. Having to choose between a patent whose value is hard to pinpoint in advance and one of known technical quality, she should rationally opt for the latter. Ergo, the introduction of TRIPS, by inadvertently offering a possible extension of patent term created a metric of patent self-valuation. The metric is simple: patents encompassing valuable technologies must be given priority and filed before the deadline. In view of this metric, we acquire information for all utility patents that were filed around June 8th 1995 for the following technology fields: Chemicals, Computers & Communications, Drugs & Medical, Electrical & Electronics, and Mechanicals. Our data is both at the industry level and the firm level, and it includes continuing applications that were filed prior to the deadline; these are applications that were originally filed prior to the unexpected regime change. The data indicates that Drugs & Medical patents, and Chemical patents, were significantly more likely to be filed before the deadline than patents in any other field. This result, which does not change at the firm level and when accounting for continuations, accords with survey evidence that finds patents as being more valuable (as incentives to innovate) to the pharmaceutical and chemical industry; see Cohen, Nelson and Walsh (2000).

The Contribution of Marketing and Branding Efforts in Food Exports: Evidence from Panel Data

Abstract This paper examines the relationship between food-related trademark activity, approximating for branding and marketing efforts, and food exports for the 48 contiguous states of the US over the period 1999–2015. We find a strong and positive relationship between these two variables. Further robustness checks, including an instrumental variables approach, provide evidence that marketing and branding activities contribute to food exports. With respect to food export policy our results point to providing incentives to the private sector (cooperatives, farmers, firms) to pursue marketing and branding efforts.