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During the 1973 annual meeting of the American Sociological Association (ASA), the author attended a roundtable discussion chaired by Professor Robert Friedrichs. The whole meeting was devoted to discussing the possibility of sociologist B.F. Skinner's influence emerging in the U.S. sociology, a topic that Friedrichs had explored in a paper he delivered earlier at one of the ASA sessions. In reference to the Skinnerian influence on sociology, the author criticizes sociologist Donald Tarter's article published in the November 1973 issue of the periodical "The American Sociologist," which stated that Friedrichs' eminence in the discipline of sociology and the Skinnerian influence is justified. The author's intention is to point out that Tarter's article is at best naive as regards his misunderstanding of sociology and that the presuppositions underlying his argument suggest an ideological position that can only be repugnant to anyone committed to a society that is as free and open as possible. The author substantiates his indictments by first commenting on what he believes to be Tarter's sociological naivety on the basis of a passage in which Tarter writes "Behavioral complexities never before thought possible have emerged in the form of pigeons playing ping-pong or chimps breaking through the communication barrier to man."

This paper first reviews the descriptions and structural explanations for variations, in urban population densities in the United States over several decades. The research reviewed focuses on shifts in the technology and economics of travel as being the major influences on urban density distributions. These variables appear to be somewhat less adequate as explanations of the process in recent decades. After reviewing these findings and suggesting several research questions, we attempt to assess the evidence relating variations in population density to several other aspects of human behavior. A review of the research relating high population densities to various "social pathologies" indicates that little of the variance in rates of these pathologies can be attributed to density independently of other social structural variables. Some important consequences of population density have been reported, however, and possible research directions are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Statistical investigations of the nature or extent of crime are often inconclusive because of the inaccuracy of police, court, and prison records. Besides, the prevalent use of such geographical units as states and nations may obscure significant differences that would appear in an inquiry of greater specificity. This study of homicide in South Carolina, a relatively homogeneous state, attempts to avoid these difficulties, since regional investigations "offer excellent opportunities for such analysis as will distinguish between causal factors and merely component relationships," and since the records of the state and federal bureaus of vital statistics give comparatively reliable data concerning homicide, the killing of one person by another except by accident or legal execution. Approximately 155000 death certificates in the files of the South Carolina Bureau of Vital Statistics were examined, the probable homicide cases secured and investigated further by letters to physicians and county authorities, and the annual rates per 100000 population calculated for each of the counties of the state, this part of the study being limited to the seven year period 1920-1926. In addition, the rates for cities of 10000 or more population were obtained for the years 1920 and 1925 from data supplied by the United States Division of Vital Statistics.