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Self-help has become a booming business over the past decades and an increasingly visible part of popular media culture worldwide. The paper analyzes the arrival and effects of this cultural technology in post- Soviet Russia after more than seventy years of socialism. It examines how Russians are engaging with popular psychology self-help as a technology of the self and how they are making it meaningful in their lives. Drawing on a set of one-to-one and focus group interviews conducted with self-help readers, it examines how these individuals negotiate the new ethics and the normative models of personhood put forward by the self-help genre. It argues that popular psychology has offered a new language for making sense of the self and the social world, and highlights how the readers critically engage with the normalizing power of popular psychology by drawing on a number of local historically sedimented discourses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Perhaps by virtue of its theoretical slipperiness, collective identity is often hailed as an important feature of social movements for the role it plays in unifying activists and organizations, and so helping them to develop shared concerns and engage in collective action. However, this paper argues that collective identity is the result of group rather than movement level processes, and although it can unite activists within a single movement organization, it is not always beneficial for the broader social movement. Although movements consist of networks of activists and organizations that have a broad shared concern, differing collective identities within the movement can actually be quite divisive. Based on case studies of three organizations in the environmental movement, this paper shows that activists who are most committed to an organization with an encompassing collective identity develop a strong sense of solidarity with other activists similarly committed to that organization. The resultant solidarity leads to the construction of a ‘we–them’ dichotomy between organizations within the same movement, increasing the chances of hostility between organizations and factions within the movement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents some questions for the attention of medical sociologists. Some medical educators, admittedly few, still subscribe to the view that they alone are competent to provide role models for medical students and that, therefore, no matter what the subject, the proper training of the physician requires that a physician teach it. Others, adopting a less extreme standpoint, appear to be prepared to accept the behavioral sciences on trust as it were, even while retaining some of these reservations and often questioning the relevance of sociological theory and method to the practical problems of health and illness. While there are then a few medical educators with reservations, it appears that the vast majority nowadays consider that sociology, psychology and anthropology, and perhaps other allied disciplines, have an acknowledged place somewhere in the medical curriculum. It is not proposed in this paper to enter into the general debate on whether the behavioral sciences have anything to contribute to medicine and should be incorporated into medical training.

Ulrich Beck has argued that the changing logic of distribution and, more importantly, the 'individualization' of social processes in reflexive modernity have killed off the concept of social class and rendered the analysis of its effects a flawed endeavour. The present paper takes issue with this perspective by exposing its key weaknesses, namely its ambivalence and contradiction over what exactly constitutes individualization and the extent to which it has really displaced class, its inconsistent and caricaturized description of what actually constitutes class, its erroneous and unsatisfactory depiction of class analysis, and its self-defeating reasoning on the motors of individualization. The intention is not to conservatively deny that social change is occurring nor to advocate any particular model of class, but only to illustrate the aporias of Beck's position with the aim of vindicating the enterprise of class analysis.

The paper conceptualizes two contradictory discourses, both used by ethnic minority drug dealers in a street drug market in Oslo, Norway. Oppression discourse includes personal narratives of unemployment, racism and psycho-social problems, often combined with stories about the government and city council being unwilling to help. Drug dealers use the discourse to justify drug dealing and violence, both for themselves and in meetings with welfare organizations. Gangster discourse, on the other hand, includes a series of personal narratives emphasizing how hard, smart, and sexually alluring the young men are. Drug dealers use this discourse to gain self-respect and respect from others, and it dominates interactions on the street. An important argument in this paper is that the discursive practice of criminals inspires theoretical perspectives on criminal practice. Oppression and gangster discourses have inspired, respectively, neutralization and subculture theory. When the same people use both discourses, however, the picture becomes more complicated. The ‘bilingual’ discursive practice of the street drug dealers reflects the ambivalent role of the researcher, and a Scandinavian institutional and social context where street drug dealers have extensive contact with a welfare state apparatus. The paper still suggests that similar interdiscursivity may have been sacrificed in previous research to produce more coherent theoretical frameworks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Treatments of sources of Adam Smith's sociological theory of the self and associated ideas inThe Theory of Moral Sentimentstypically refer to classical antecedents or the work of his teacher Francis Hutcheson or his contemporary David Hume. During the seventeenth century, however, many books on the passions were published in London that arguably constitute an important but neglected source of Smith's treatment of moral sentiments. These works are largely forgotten today but at the time were widely read. They are not philosophical, partly devotional and predominantly psychological. Although Smith does not refer to these works his argument resembles theirs in many places. The importance of the seventeenth-century books on the passions, apart from their role in the history of psychology, is their bearing on contemporary economic practices. In this paper the connections between Smith and one of these books, Thomas Wright'sThe Passions of the Minde in Generall, are indicated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neo-Weberian closure theory developed principally by Parkin appears at first glance to suffer from two opposing weaknesses — that its central concept of exclusion is either too broad or too narrow. This paper demonstrates that these objections are spurious. It then uncovers several real problems which have not yet been examined by the critics of closure theory. These problems have to do with Parkin's conceptions of usurpation, of the withdrawal of services, and of property, as well as with the ambiguity in the politics of Parkin's closure theory. The paper corrects these weaknesses and clarifies this ambiguity and concludes that closure theory so-corrected provides a promising framework for going beyond analyses focused narrowly on one particular means of domination and one particular set of monopolization and exclusion rules to a focus on monopolization and exclusion per se. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many sociologists have observed the close connection between coordination and rhythm. In order to accomplish a communal task, participants need to develop a common rhythm if they are to coordinate their actions. Indeed, the harder the collective task, the more critical - but difficult - it is for participants to develop a common rhythm in order to synchronize their actions. Rhythm is thus an important and recurrent feature of social performance. This article explores the ways in which participants try to generate common rhythm in order to execute collective performances. To this end, the paper takes a single sporting example. It examines a decisive period in the 153rd Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race in 2007 to examine how a small social group, the Cambridge crew, struggled to create and maintain a rhythm in order to maximize their rowing performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many sociologists have observed the close connection between coordination and rhythm. In order to accomplish a communal task, participants need to develop a common rhythm if they are to coordinate their actions. Indeed, the harder the collective task, the more critical - but difficult - it is for participants to develop a common rhythm in order to synchronize their actions. Rhythm is thus an important and recurrent feature of social performance. This article explores the ways in which participants try to generate common rhythm in order to execute collective performances. To this end, the paper takes a single sporting example. It examines a decisive period in the 153rd Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race in 2007 to examine how a small social group, the Cambridge crew, struggled to create and maintain a rhythm in order to maximize their rowing performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Butler and Stokes' authoritative analysis of the British electorate concluded that in general voters' political attitudes were poorly formed and, in consequence, unstable and inconsistent. 'This paper re-examines this question by developing and evaluating multiple-item scales of two core dimensions of mass political beliefs: left-right and libertarian-authoritarian values. The scales are shown to have respectable levels of internal consistency, high levels of stability over a one-year period, and to be useful predictors of support for political parties. In these respects they compare favourably with other commonly used indicators of political attitudes, values and ideology (left-right self-placement, post-materialism and attitudes to nationalization). This superiority applies across different levels of political involvement. Contrary to the conclusions of earlier research into mass political ideology in Britain, therefore, it is contended that in general the electorate has meaningful political beliefs. Moreover, as the scales developed in this research form part of the British and Northern Irish Social Attitudes Series and recent British Election Studies, they provide an important resource for further studies of political culture in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 'Flynn effect' describes the substantial and long‐standing increase in average cognitive ability test scores, which has been observed in numerous psychological studies. Flynn makes an appeal for researchers to move beyond psychology's standard disciplinary boundaries and to consider sociological contexts, in order to develop a more comprehensive understanding of cognitive inequalities. In this article we respond to this appeal and investigate social class inequalities in general cognitive ability test scores over time. We analyse data from the National Child Development Study (1958) and the British Cohort Study (1970). These two British birth cohorts are suitable nationally representative large‐scale data resources for studying inequalities in general cognitive ability. We observe a large parental social class effect, net of parental education and gender in both cohorts. The overall finding is that large social class divisions in cognitive ability can be observed when children are still at primary school, and similar patterns are observed in each cohort. Notably, pupils with fathers at the lower end of the class structure are at a distinct disadvantage. This is a disturbing finding and it is especially important because cognitive ability is known to influence individuals later in the lifecourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since King and Mc Dermott (1995), following Downes (1988), defined the psychological oppressiveness of incarceration in terms of 'weight', little has been written about the 'weight of imprisonment'. None the less, it is generally assumed that prisons that are 'light' are preferable to those that are 'heavy' - in part because of an assumption among many penologists that power, and its application, is dangerous and antagonistic. This article does not dispute that 'heavy' prisons are undesirable. Its argument is that there can also be dangers if prisons are excessively light. Many of these dangers are linked to the under-use of power. The tone and quality of prison life depends on the combined effects of institutional weight with the 'absence' or 'presence' of staff power. Drawing on prisoners' descriptions of their experiences in public and private sector prisons, and their assessments of important aspects of their quality of life, the article outlines what these concepts mean in practice. The authors develop a four-quadrant framework for conceptualizeng penal legitimacy and the experience of penal authority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a considerable body of evidence from earlier research to show that offending is associated with an increased risk of victimization, and being a victim with an increased risk of offending. There have been few earlier studies of the link. These have generally set out to test specific explanations, for example, the idea that the same lifestyles or routine activities may be associated with both victimization and offending. In a current study of a cohort of 4,300 adolescents in Edinburgh we have found a correlation of 0.421 between crime victimization and self-reported offending at the age of 15 when offending peaks. Variables chosen to test three broad types of theory – life-style and routine activities, weak social bonds, aspects of personality – are shown to be related both to victimization and to offending in adolescence. The present analysis uses latent class growth mixture models to track the dynamic relationships over time between adolescent victimization and offending both before and after controlling for these explanatory variables. In the short term, offending is strongly related to a later rise in victimization, but in the longer term to a fall that tends to cancel out the earlier rise. These findings remain the same after controlling for the ten explanatory variables. Victimization is associated with a later rise in offending in the longer term. The theoretical perspectives suggested by earlier researchers are fairly successful in explaining this linkage running from victimization to offending. Future research should focus on the role of peer influence in linking victimization and offending, and should push forward the analysis into the adult years. The implications for criminal justice policy could be far-reaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information about the relation between sociologist E. Durkheim's concepts of anomie and egoism. While the obscurity of Durkheim's distinction has frequently been commented upon, it is implicitly assumed to be irrelevant for contemporary theorization in social pathology. Against this view, two theses will be advanced. Firstly, if Durkheim had pursued and attempted to clarify his distinction between the two concepts, he would have been forced to re-examine the presuppositions upon which his sociology had been based. Secondly, despite difficulties in Durkheim's theory in which concepts of anomie and egoism play a crucial part, a distinction between them still has to be drawn which in fact retains some elements of their original meaning. All contemporary studies of anomie have neglected the distinction between anomie and egoism with the result that social conditions, psychological states and processes which are entirely different from one another have been assimilated.

Professions whose principal function is to bring about changes in the physical or psychological personality of the client are the personal service professions, whilst all other professions which are not charged with responsibilities of this sort or, at any rate, which do not set themselves such tasks as these, are the impersonal service professions. It is my contention that this distinction has a marked sociological significance and the author hopes to show that it is also strongly suggested by the facts and not merely by desire to engage in sociological speculations. No doubt the two classes of the professions have certain basic allegiances in common but these allegiances are elaborated, enriched and refined only in the personal service professions and this is at the very root of the distinctions the author is trying to make. To understand the ideological orientations of the personal service professions one must bear in mind that these professions are nowadays being trained in a socio psychological theory, and indoctrinated with moral principles, which inspite of all protestations by the more rigorous scientists of behaviour-are fundamentally Freudian in origin. Kindness, tolerance, acceptance, permissiveness, and a scepticism about strong loves and hates, have received a new lease of life in this psychoanalytical, social psychological, and sociological century. It is certainly easy to prove that in all these areas of personal service the counsellors basically psychoanalytical and social psychological ideology conquered and converted one may say that those in the personal service professions have been influenced by the counselling ideology even if they do no counselling themselves and even if they are unaware of this influence.

The two most important pieces of British research into effects of accommodation upon students come to opposite conclusions. Researcher Thoday's study of Birmingham University students in 1951-1952 found that those in a hail of residence "took on average a greater part in university life than others" as measured by their use of the union, their membership of student societies, outside interests, and range of friendships. These results, she argued, "support the general view that residence in hail adds much to these opportunities provided by the provincial university. Full residential places for all would therefore seem to be the ideal." In 1962 Marris compared hail and lodgings students at Cambridge, Leeds and Southampton in respect of their range of friendships, frequency with which they took part in informal discussions, contact with staff, reading outside their subject, participation in sport and societies, and university examination results. He found that halls did not "promote either general reading or academic performance," that they "did not influence the pattern of social life very profoundly," and that they "may not, after all, contribute significantly to education."

This article is not concerned so much with either functions or origins of incest taboos--subjects on which too many words have been wasted already, but rather with incest behaviour and the motivation underlying it. It is too easy to list either dire consequences of incestuous behaviour or beneficial effects of non-incestuous behaviour and not so easy to discover what motivates actors with respect to incest. To point out that the practice of incest would result in various calamities is not necessarily to state reasons for the non-performance of actors in this area, nor is to list beneficial effects of non-incestuous behaviour a sufficient explanation of the behaviour in question. Statements of dire results are not statements of why actors are motivated to the non-performance or punishment of the performance of incest, they are statements of what would happen if actors were not so motivated. Reasons why it should not or could not happen are not necessarily reasons why it does not happen. Too often we are told that there must be incest taboos and phobias. What this article suggests is that the 'sexless' brother-sister should be taken at its face value and merely repeats the experience of many other societies.

The article focuses on areas which reflect changes in race relations among Afro-Americans. The article illustrates five areas of change. These are armed forces, public school desegregation, public and private housing, professional baseball and college teaching. The speed of changes in race relations displayed in these areas have been uneven. It has been suggested that changes have been most rapid in areas where economic values are supported, as in the case of baseball. The change has been slowest where economic values are threatened as in the case of private housing. The speed of change appeared to be most positively influenced, where attitudes previously held by Afro-Americans as well as whites were favorable toward the change and where there existed a strong commitment to the change by those in a power position to effect the change. While edicts and laws appear to be related to the speed and efficiency of change in areas involving large numbers of people, extra-legal means can, do and have served as initiating and accelerating forces for change.

The article discusses biases in psychology as those caused by the social circumstances. Method-ideology lays great stress on the use of the experimental method as the source of data in psychology and emphasizes the desirability of quantifying. Most psychologists know what it is to have observed a certain phenomenon and to have found it too difficult to reproduce experimentally. It is a natural consequence that experiments tend to be limited to effects that can be easily produced. The tendency is perhaps most marked in the field of personality assessment. Another example of crude theorizing in animal psychology lies in the experiments on imitation. Experimenters have had little success in bringing this about experimentally. But the special circumstances in which one might have expected it most likely to occur, when an animal is young and dependent and the model is a parent, do not seem to have been examined. Another influence might come from the way research in psychology is organized. As with any other subject, where the research has been tied to the teaching and not many students have taken the subject, psychologists have been distributed over a large number of small groups.

This article discusses the contribution of psychoanalysis to ethics. The contribution of psychoanalysis may be considered from three points of view. In the first place, what light analytic theory throws on the natural history of morals, that is the ways in which moral rules and moral sentiments are formed and developed in the individual and the group. There is also a question whether psychoanalysis can, from its own resources, provide the basis for an ethical theory or a set of standards or principles in the light of which existing moral codes can be criticized or evaluated. Finally, there is the question how far the insight into human nature acquired through the exploration of the unconscious elements in the human mind can help us in releasing the energies of man and removing the obstacles that hinder the realization of his ideals, whatever may be their ultimate source. The problems raised in the first two questions are not always clearly distinguished by psychoanalytic writers and some would deny that there is such a thing as ethical theory other than the psychology of morals. Sigmund Freud himself tells us that it is not the object of his investigations to provide an ethic, still less a Weltanschauung. Such activities, he says, may be left to philosophers who avowedly find it impossible to make their journey through life without a Baedeker of that kind to tell them about everything.

The article focuses on the historical pattern of psycho-analysis. Some twenty years ago psycho-analysis, Freudianism in particular, seemed to have been assimilated and consequently given its own place within Western civilization. Psycho-analysis was regarded as one among many hypotheses about the structure and evolution of the human mind. The first important fact about the present psycho-analytical revival is that it comes from the U.S. where psycho-analysis has been adopted mainly as a clinical practice. The lead taken by U.S. literature in making use of psycho-analytical ideas is a characteristic aspect of this phenomenon. The second factor in the popularity of psycho-analysis derives from the psychological repercussions of the Second World War. Due to the high frequency of mental disorders during the post-war period, psycho-analysis as a psycho-therapeutic method is more useful now than at any other time. The late war had a second even more important effect. It has in many aspects brought Western society nearer to the socio-cultural pattern characteristic of the Austro-Hungarian Empire during the last decades of its existence. It would be more accurate to say that it has brought London and Paris closer to the Vienna of 1900. All these circumstances have contributed greatly to the weakening of the critical resistance which was present twenty years ago. This study is a short account of the historical conditions of some fundamental psycho-analytical ideas, such as the discovery of the unconscious, as the principal layer of the mental energy; the bivalence of this energy as the life and death instincts; the stratification of mental life and the relationship between consciousness and the unconscious.