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Considerable attention has been given recently to the perplexing problem of the relationship between attitudes and behavior (Ehrlich, 1969; Deutscher, 1969; Warner and DeFleur, 1969; Ajzen et al., 1970; Lastrucci, 1970; Tarter, 1970). Methodological issues have been debated, the lack of congruence between attitudes and behavior has been examined, and a variety of solutions have been offered. We are told, for example, that the continuing poor correlation between measured attitudes and overt behavior requires us to search for the intervening variable or variables which apparently obtain (Ehrlich, 1969); or to employ the "direct observation" of the phenomenon under investigation rather than try to extrapolate from paper-and-pencil tests to behavior (Deutscher, 1969); or to develop theories that, in turn, enable us to find indicators that are more valid than the paper-and-pencil type (Lastrueci, 1970); or to simply admit that attitudes as "presently conceptualized play no real role in behavior" (Tarter, 1970). A number of important aspects of attitude research, however, have been obscured or omitted in these discussions. For the surprising aspect of the situation is not, as has often been implied, the lack of congruence between attitudes and behavior, but the persistent use of research designs that are inappropriate for the complexity of the subject under investigation. Further, it is surprising that researchers have failed to draw out other important implications of their research. That is, the fact that an attitude does not lead directly to a behavior does not justify the assertion that attitudes play no role in behavior, or that attitude research lacks significant implications for social life. The basis for this latter statement will be shown below in a discussion of the values of attitude research. It may be that inadequate research designs, valued for their simplicity rather than their appropriateness, are a manifestation of the "publish or perish" syndrome. In any ease, this paper attempts to outline the problems and the values of attitude research, and to demonstrate thereby that such research is of great significance for the understanding of social phenomena. If that significance seems minimized by those studies that have found poor correlation between attitudes and behavior, the fault lies both in the failure to create research designs that reflect the complexity of the problem and in the tendency to exalt the importance of the proximate causes of overt behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present experiment was designed to reappraise a series of studies that have shown that people differentiate more among persons whom they dislike than they like. The issue raised in this paper is that the results reported in previous research may not necessarily support the hypotheses formulated to account for these results. Such hypotheses (in particular the Miller and Bieri vigilance hypothesis) have traditionally implied a certain type and direction of causality in the data. The present study reveals that perceived complexity can be manipulated by having subjects justify their choice of liked and disliked objects. This finding would seem to require a reinterpretation of previous data, and an alternative hypothesis is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reported experiment is based on a few assumptions. First that people perceive each other in the two dimensions of tower as the ability to satisfy needs, and acceptance defined as the willingness to do so. A new research tool, based on these assumptions, the statogram, has been introduced. The second assumption (tested in other experiments) is that human groups should be divided into Instrumental, Mutual Acceptance, and Vectorial ones according to the objectives of their members. The experimental group reported here was an Instrumental one. Leadership in an Instrumental group has been studied experimentally in the reported experiment. Leadership has been defined as a relationship between two parts of a group in which one part, the leader (s), initiates, stimulates, and sometimes even determines the activities of the other part called follower (s). This study emphasizes the situational factors in leadership. Leadership is a function of the specific situation in a group. Specific hypothesis has been brought forward that in an Instrumental group, leadership is rather a function of power than of acceptance. A group of six subjects was assembled, two of them especially instructed, one of them had to behave like a strong but unfriendly person while the other had to be very friendly and weak. The results of statogram and of observers, mutually highly correlated, did prove what has been anticipated. A series of experiments are being conducted to develop the new research tool applied in this study and to corroborate further and on larger samples the hypothesis proposed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is the thesis of this paper that the theoretical trend within the sociology of science during the past three decades has increasingly embraced an implicit organic model of science and this is an incorrect model of science. It is further hypothesized that a mechanical model is more appropriate, and many of the empirical "facts" which have supported the organic approach are equally valid for the mechanical. This paper presents an argument to support these hypotheses composed of the following parts. First, the organic and mechanical models are described and discussed as a composite of the famous typologies of Durkheim and Toennies. In addition, those aspects of these models which have undergone conceptual transformation since their early formulation will be discussed insofar as they have a bearing upon the application of the models to the scientific community. Second, the theoretical history of the sociology of science will be presented and critically examined to illustrate exactly how components of the organic model entered this history at various times and in various guises. Third, the social characteristics of science will be compared to the organic and mechanical models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The importance of scientific work depends on the number of scientific values it brings out and the extent to which allowance is made for each of these values. A perfect paper in social science should, among other things, build on safe data applicable to a representative sample. According to the nature of the research work concerned they have to weigh deliberately the gains obtained in certain respects against the losses incurred in other respects, or at least attempt to proceed as if they have done so. Different research workers easily come to weighing out the elements differently. There may be agreement about the scientific values but not about the weights to be attributed to them in research work. It is easy to acquire a knowledge of scientific values. It is difficult to adapt them. This is, however, a circumstance of which young research students are ignorant. Instead, they revolt at finding that such a large number of investigations turn out to be failures in so many respects. Later on, when they start doing their own investigation, they have to realize that there is a great distance between their aspirations and their results.

One of the major gaps in research in TST measured self-conception is data relevant to the assumption that self-conception is a stable structure of meanings attached to self. This paper indicates the inconsistency between current theoretical and empirical orientations in the area of self-conception and outlines three basic models of the processual characteristics of self-conception found in the literature. Using a ten wave panel design in which self-conception is measured repeatedly throughout the subjects' daily interactional routines, specific hypotheses derived from the models are tested. Results suggest which model is most appropriate for the description of the processual characteristics of various aspects of self-conception and the possible errors involved in the continued use of current self-conception research designs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers have long been aware that when they become part of the system they are investigating, their own behavior may a.fleet the behavior they wish to study. Little data has been collected on the effect of respondents on the researcher and the consequences of this on tho research process. The problem is described and analyzed in this paper. We contend that respondents who have special qualities may intrude upon the researcher's role and make it difficult for him to collect necessary data. An illustration is presented from the authors' study of stripteasers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

No research results are any better than the quality of the data. As scientists, survey researchers must share the problems of measuring, understanding, and controlling bias in their data. The potential sources of bias in survey research are many and varied. They may appear at any one or all of the several stages of the data gathering process. For example, they may occur in the selection of the sample, in the development of measuring instruments, in securing the responses of the persons in the sample, in the respondents replies, in the recording of the responses, and in processing the recorded responses. Even beyond the data collection process, bias may occur, as in the misapplication of statistics and in the interpretation of data. Progress has been made toward identifying and controlling sources of bias in some of these stages of the research process. Perhaps most progress has been made in the sampling stage and in the statistical application stage. Much advance has been made also in the reduction of error at the instrumentation stage. However, considerable work remains to be done on the problems of error control, especially biasing error, at all stages of the research between instrumentation and statistical analysis. This includes getting full response from the sample, accurate answers to the questions asked, and accurate recording and processing of responses. The accumulation of bias from these and other possible sources may be referred to as total or aggregate bias. The total bias may then be divided for analytical purposes into the following types: (1) sampling bias, (2) instrumentation bias, (3) non-response bias, (4) respondent bias, (5) interviewer bias, and (6) processing bias. This paper is an effort to deal with the problem of respondent bias in survey research. That respondent bias is a potent force in diminishing the validity and reliability of results from survey research is well recognized. The recognition of this condition has led to an enormous amount of activity aimed at isolating factors which determine this weakness of research results. These studies, by and large, have dealt with the problem of determining the direction of respondent bias, its magnitude, the speearle variables which produce respondent bias, and the effect of such bias on research results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A number of questions have been recently raised or re-raised with respect to the status and intended function in sociology of the methodological device known as the "type." Martindale's summary of the historical and contemporary uses to which the typology has been put as well as his formulation of the issues connected with such use permits the economy of moving directly into a specification of the problems considered in this paper, and the proposed solutions. The present effort is directed primarily at providing one solution to the often raised problem of "the relation between the idealization involved in the type and the empirical reality," although less pressing issues are also treated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author clarifies the points made by critic Leonard Beeghley about his sociological research on four function paradigm. The critic is correct in his contention that the paper missed the point on the dual application in the four function paradigm. The reasons why the paper never went too far with the argument is the lack of necessity to do so. However, the author examined the propositions upon which the four function paradigm is based and finding them contradictory, felt there was no need to deal with the applications of the paradigm that depended upon the validity of the propositions. Furthermore, the difficulties in the paradigm are so abundant that quite independent additional arguments can be advanced against it. Thus, while the argument presented in the research that the paradigm's foundational propositions are contradictory, the arguments presented in the research is quite sufficient.

The article focuses on cross-cultural communication in research work. If complete desire to communicate and readiness to understand is granted in the research, then the following possibilities come into focus as due to the nature of the human communication process as well as to the nature of human personality. Firstly, certain foreign experts cannot communicate successfully in any cross-cultural situation. Secondly, certain experts may be able to communicate in any cross-cultural situation and finally, experts from certain cultures or sub-cultures may be more successful at cross-cultural communication in a given situation than experts from other cultures or sub-cultures. The first perspective could be in the form of the syllogistic type. The second perspective could be phrased in terms of cross-cultural contact between individuals of different socio-economic levels or strata of culture. The third perspective could be phrased in terms of cross-cultural communication between individuals whose respective social systems are out-of-phase.

The article presents remarks on the sociology of social scientists. Initially, social science ought to engage in the critical analysis of society, which implies that social scientists should engage in discussing unsolved social problems, in analyzing them, and in taking a position on controversial subjects. Secondly, social science ought to be used as a tool for social planning which means that social science ought to put its knowledge at the disposal of politicians and those responsible for planning. Thirdly, social science ought to be used in social engineering, which means that social scientists should actively participate in solving social problems. In general it is difficult to measure the influence of social scientific research. One possibility would be to measure the way research is presented in the mass media and to observe the influence that it has on the reasoning of opinions transmitters and on opinion leaders. Thus the results of research may be used in opinion formation.

On the basis of balance theory, certain distinct typologies of modernization combining both individual and system variables were developed in the study. Of primary concern was the interaction between the two variables of modernizing characteristics in attempting to predict the extent of modernity of different social systems. Three hypotheses generated on this basis were tested and were found to have been borne out by the data. Results indicated a substantial degree of interaction between the two variables of modernizing characteristics. individuals high on both individual and system variables displayed more modernity than those who were high on one type of variable and low on the other, or those who were low on both variables. In the case of imbalanced situations (that is, when an individual variable is high but the system variable is low, and vice versa), system effects seemed to predominate over individual effects, and the dominance was greater when individual effects were lower. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Replication is one of several methodological techniques that contributes to the verification of survey research data. A critique of the literature on replication reveals that limited systematic attention has been given to its various functions in the process of verification. A replication paradigm is formulated to clarify terminology and functions. The paradigm consists of four major replication types: retest, internal, independent, and theoretical. These are analyzed and illustrated by published replication studies. An argument is offered in favor of the increased use of replication in survey research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The state of current theory is one of variety. Not only are there a few competing large schools or systems, these attracting most of the attention, but there also exists a far larger number of small theories, more likely to be used in research. Complicating the picture are two other trends. One is the intensification of the long standing "humanist-positivist" polarity in the 1960's at the expense of the Theory-Method ideal. The other is the fact that much of the field remains empiricist, following neither large theory nor small but confining its "theorizing" to the conceptual level. Ail these exist in modem sociology and present a picture of diversity. Moreover, one ought not to be too sanguine about an integrated future. First, as the field continues to grow, it not only expands into new areas of human concern but gains strength cross-culturally—these creating at least a temporary heterogeneity of standpoint. Second, and a more basic barrier to integration, is the likely prospect that the heterogeneity of subject matter of a given field—such as sociology—requires several different theories that must be used alternatively and selectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociology is believed to be the most methodology-conscious of the social sciences. Difficulties in defining who are the good and bad in sociological arguments have been the focus of much debate among social scientists and the debate has greatly influenced the need for methodology in the discipline. The article examines some fundamental issues in methodology as applied to sociology. While the placement of method as the essence of science can generate a sort of methodolatry, it is only fair to examine in some detail the sort of propositions dealt with in any inquiry. The goal is for all to be equally and very rigorous, contingent specially on the degree to which the problem is rigorously stated.

Since the impetus and design of research inevitably derive from a set of assumptions, whether explicit or not, the nature of fact—the categories in which something is captured out of the Deal world"—is dependent upon these assumptions. It is reason enough to suggest that in efforts to advance sociological knowledge at least as much care should be given to explicating the linkages of ideas as to empirical operations. The positivist traditions of sociology have, however, often meant that high-level, "general" or even "middle range" theorizing has been more of an avocation than a vocation for most sociologists, and that much more rigor, energy, and professional skill have in recent decades gone into the empirical aspect of research than into the theoretical. Though the bearings of theory and research upon each other have been usefully discussed and have, in fact, become a kind of credo, almost any published discussion lacking in figures and tables and involving some commentary beyond sheer description has been capable of definition as "theory." Where so little has been expected, relatively little by way of intellectual and other resources has been invested. Consequently, the returns have been small. Even when serious theoretical work has been attempted, it has often received something less than systematic consideration. Such work—some examples undoubtedly more scholarly and sophisticated than others—has been given more or less favorable receptions largely in accord with semantic preferences, generally unspecific "orientations," and degrees of sympathy for speculation as, hopefully and somehow, relevant to real research. Other than to note particular historical events and to cite research findings considered pertinent to some statement or other contained in a discussion, the supporters, sympathizers, and opponents of theorizing have rarely spelled out the criteria by which judgment was delivered. In short, the problems of theory construction have been neglected in favor of the more obviously empirical problems of research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The article focuses on changes in political attitudes by socio-religious groupings. Studies demonstrating changes in behavior from one specified period in time to another have formed the bases of research advances in nearly every science except sociology. But in recent years, studies of certain political issues at two relatively distant time periods have been made and are now becoming generally available to add a new dimension to theory and research. Roper polls are becoming generally available through the Williamstown Center, and the Survey Research Center's election studies are available through the Consortium for Political Research. In order to use these studies effectively, even beyond the methodological questions of the multiplicity of changing control variables and comparable operational definitions, a major challenge is to specify precisely what is changing and what is the theoretical process model to clarify "linkages" in these changes. The model must specify the major parameters within which change is expected, and because the research methodology is still somewhat gross, the model must be relatively simple.

The author criticizes the article by David J. Gray published in the periodical "Sociological Quarterly." In the article, Gray claims that the chief characteristic of our whole historical development is to have swept cleanly away all the older social forms of organization. One of Gray's failures, according to the author, is his shifting of meaning for value and value free. The highest use to which Gray's article might be put would be as material for a class exercise in conceptual analysis. Gray has also overlooked the fact that sociologists, like medical researchers, may legitimately adopt value positions.