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Power dynamics influence every aspect of scientific collaboration. Team power dynamics can be measured by team power level and team power hierarchy. Team power level is conceptualized as the average level of the possession of resources, expertise, or decision‐making authorities of a team. Team power hierarchy represents the vertical differences of the possessions of resources in a team. In Science of Science, few studies have looked at scientific collaboration from the perspective of team power dynamics. This research examines how team power dynamics affect team impact to fill the research gap. In this research, all coauthors of one publication are treated as one team. Team power level and team power hierarchy of one team are measured by the mean and Gini index of career age of coauthors in this team. Team impact is quantified by citations of a paper authored by this team. By analyzing over 7.7 million teams from Science (e.g., Computer Science, Physics), Social Sciences (e.g., Sociology, Library & Information Science), and Arts & Humanities (e.g., Art), we find that flat team structure is associated with higher team impact, especially when teams have high team power level. These findings have been repeated in all five disciplines except Art, and are consistent in various types of teams from Computer Science including teams from industry or academia, teams with different gender groups, teams with geographical contrast, and teams with distinct size. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bourdieu is an important thinker within the sociological tradition and has a philosophically sophisticated approach to theoretical knowledge and research practice. In this paper, we examine the implication of his work for nursing and the health sciences more broadly. We argue that his work is best described as a reflexive realist who provides a space for a nonpositivist approach to knowledge that does not fall into the trap of idealism or relativism. We emphasize that Bourdieu was not an abstract theorist, but only utilized theories to understand and explain the social world in all its empirical complexity. Theory is emphasized over method without denying the importance of method. We then provide a brief overview of some of his key concepts: habitus, field and capital. His work is a scientifically astute practice that has an emancipatory purpose, with particular resonance to the problems of nursing as a social practice. Some have criticized Bourdieu for undermining agency and we briefly address this issue, but argue that his conceptual framework helps us to understand what endures in social practice and why change is often problematic. In short, this paper argues that Bourdieu's work is a fruitful resource for critiquing existing nursing approaches that are preoccupied with agency over structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accompanying the ageing of contemporary ageing societies is an increase in age associated morbidity, with dementia having an important impact. Mental frailty in later life is a source of fear for many and a major policy concern to all those concerned with health and welfare services. This introduction to the special issue on 'Ageing, dementia and the social mind' situates the selected papers within the context of debates about dementia and its social relations. In particular it draws attention to the importance of the social imaginary of the fourth age and what this means for the issue of personhood, care, social representations of dementia and its social contextualisation. The papers illuminating these themes draw on a variety of disciplines and approaches; from the social sciences to the humanities and from the theoretical to the empirical in order to help orientate future researchers to the complexities of dementia and the social and cultural matrix in which it exists. This paper provides an introduction to the potential for a more extended sociology of dementia; one which could combine the insights from medical sociology with the concerns of social gerontology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper discusses a survey of British academic human geographers enquiring about change and diversification within personal research activities, their nature, motivations and impacts. It argues that this is widespread and a significant aspect of the production of contemporary geographical knowledge. The findings highlight the range of motivations underpinning research change, its impacts and mediation through the institutional context of British human geography. It concludes that despite a more prescriptive institutional context geographers have a degree of autonomy, albeit somewhat fettered, to shape their own research trajectories to some extent. This provides some important capacity with which to engage with imminent challenges facing the discipline in the UK). The paper complements recent critical histories of geography and sociological accounts of the discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rationale, aims & objective Tools for the assessment of the quality of research studies tend to be specific to a particular research design (e.g. randomized controlled trials, or qualitative interviews). This makes it difficult to assess the quality of a body of research that addresses the same or a similar research question but using different approaches. The aim of this paper is to describe the development and preliminary evaluation of a quality assessment tool that can be applied to a methodologically diverse set of research articles. Methods The 16-item quality assessment tool (QATSDD) was assessed to determine its reliability and validity when used by health services researchers in the disciplines of psychology, sociology and nursing. Qualitative feedback was also gathered from mixed-methods health researchers regarding the comprehension, content, perceived value and usability of the tool. Results Reference to existing widely used quality assessment tools and experts in systematic review confirmed that the components of the tool represented the construct of 'good research technique' being assessed. Face validity was subsequently established through feedback from a sample of nine health researchers. Inter-rater reliability was established through substantial agreement between three reviewers when applying the tool to a set of three research papers (κ = 71.5%), and good to substantial agreement between their scores at time 1 and after a 6-week interval at time 2 confirmed test-retest reliability. Conclusions The QATSDD shows good reliability and validity for use in the quality assessment of a diversity of studies, and may be an extremely useful tool for reviewers to standardize and increase the rigour of their assessments in reviews of the published papers which include qualitative and quantitative work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper makes a case for academic research and writing that looks beyond the learning potential of technology and, instead, seeks to develop social scientific accounts of the often compromised and constrained realities of education technology use ‘on the ground’. The paper discusses how this ‘critical’ approach differs from the ways that educational technology scholarship has tended to be pursued to date. These differences include viewing technology as being socially constructed and negotiated rather than imbued with pre-determined characteristics; developing objective and realistic accounts of technology use in situ; and producing ‘context rich’ analyses of the social conflicts and politics that underpin the use of technology in educational settings. The paper concludes by encouraging academic researchers and writers to show greater interest in the issues of democracy and social justice that surround educational technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that current child and childhood research is problematical in as much as there is a discrepancy between theory and research practice. Although in theory, children are conceptualised as active agents in the social world, the type of research that children are typically involved in implies that children are competent, knowledgeable and affective only in terms of their own lives, their own spaces, their own childhoods. The implications of this discrepancy are discussed. The paper concludes that although research that contributes to a greater understanding of childhood experiences is important, it is equally important to involve children in research that goes beyond ‘childhood’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To provide rigour when preparing a research design, the researcher needs to carefully consider not only the methodology but also the philosophical intent of the study. This, however, is often absent from reported research and provides the reader with little evidence by which to judge the merits of the chosen methodology and its influence on the study. The purpose of this paper is to set out the case for critical realism as a framework to guide appropriate action in practice development and realistic evaluation for understanding the consequences of those actions. It is evident that critical realism and critical social science share common ground. Emancipatory practice development (ePD) is based on the philosophy of critical social science and therefore by virtue is linked to the tenets of critical realism. Until now, the evaluation of ePD programme has been well served by 4th-generation evaluation. However, this paper outlines the need for a different approach to evaluation, one that is based on critical realism, that is concerned with emancipation, and that can be used in the ever-changing environment of clinical practice. Realistic evaluation not only links strongly to ePD programmes, but also serves as the basis for effective research questions that will test the outcomes of the research and inform the transferability of ePD mechanisms into differing contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this journal is to provide a medium for the publication of original papers covering the entire span of sociological thought and research. The editor is particularly keen to publish work on current developments in research and analysis. All contributions, correspondence and books for review should be addressed to The British Journal of Sociology, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London. Papers submitted for publication are normally read by at least two assessors as well as by one of the editors. The editor's decision will be final. A decision of an article will usually be sent to authors within four months of submission, however, whilst every effort will be made to follow this practice, it should be understood that there may be circumstances where this will be difficult to guarantee. Articles submitted to the journal should be an original piece of work, not been published before and not being considered for publication elsewhere in its final form either in printed or electronic form.

This paper addresses spatial inequality as an emerging specialty area in sociology. Rural sociologists have long attended to spatial inequalities. The authors tend to view their work as uniquely centered on the rural experience, as opposed to occupying the forefront of spatializing stratification theory and of sociology as a whole. First the development of sociological interest in spatial inequality is discussed, providing an overview of factors that have contributed to a spatial trend in the study of stratification. Then, the implications for rural sociology are discussed, describing how rural sociologists contribute to research on spatial inequality, and distinguishes the approach of rural sociology from those of other subfields and disciplines. Finally, some examples of research in this emerging specialty area are highlighted by drawing from papers included in this issue. The authors call for the development of research based on qualitative approaches to provide deeper insights into the processes linking space with stratification, both from the perspective of people who are disadvantaged and from the standpoint of those who enjoy an advantage because of such a connection. They encourage the development of international and cross-national research on spatial inequality to broaden the understanding of the links between space and inequality.

Identifying, locating and interpreting both what is present and what is not present in theory and data lies at the core of scientific practice. Most experienced researchers know that social reality and psychological phenomena cannot always be apprehended directly, and that the forces that shape them must often be inferred rather than positively demonstrated. Yet, the important analytical problems raised by "absence" have rarely occupied the centre stage in professional journals. The aim of this paper is to sensitise researchers to the problem of absence. It considers the various guises in which absences may appear, their repercussions in the research process, and the solutions that researchers have used to render absences visible. The paper focuses on the issue of absence as it appears in theory and research on social representations. A typology of absence, structured in terms of the research process, is proposed. The typology is intended purely as a heuristic tool. It identifies and discusses forms of theoretical, methodological, empirical and analytical/interpretive absences. This typology is used to explore forms of absence and their interrelationships throughout the research process in three studies on social representations. The discussion as a whole contributes to reaffirming the radical character of the theory of social representations by stressing how the latter locates the space of explanation at the interface between individual and collective representations, between social and cognitive processes, between intentional and non-conscious dynamics, and between material and symbolic realities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is based on a qualitative research study, Children, Parents and Risk. This study looks at the ways in which risks to children are understood and managed by children and parents. The paper focuses on two areas of the research—gaining access and interviewing—in order to show how the research process itself has constituted an important source of data on childhood and risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to provide an overview of ethical issues related to social research with children. It sets the discussion in the context of current debates about researching children in the UK, and explores the extent to which children should be regarded as similar to, or different from, adults in social research, focusing on how children are positioned as vulnerable, incompetent and relatively powerless in society in general, and how this conceptualisation of children needs to be taken into account in social research. The paper concludes with some practical and methodological suggestions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper tells of the social constructs surrounding young children with learning difficulties in their home, 'special' early education setting and 'inclusive' or mainstream early education setting in England. The exploratory study focused on how three- to four-year-old children made sense of their environments and how their identities were constructed by different parties in the different contexts. Ethnographic case studies were conducted using semi-structured and informal interviews with parents and practitioners, documentary analysis, fieldnotes, and live and video observations. Shared constructions across the contexts for each child were common, with constructions of them being happy and making progress pervasive across the children and settings. Differences in constructions across settings indicated that qualities could shine or negative constructions be tempered, thus showing the role of the environment and the culture of inclusion in socially constructing children with special needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reviews the international research on young people leaving care. Set in the context of a social exclusion framework, it explores young people’s accelerated and compressed transitions to adulthood, and discusses the development and classification of leaving care services in responding to their needs. It then considers the evidence from outcome studies and argues that adopting a resilience framework suggests that young people leaving care may fall into three groups: young people ‘moving on’, ‘survivors’ and ‘victims’. In concluding, it argues that these three pathways are associated with the quality of care young people receive, their transitions from care and the support they receive after care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT:In order to delimit the realm of social phenomena, sociologists refer implicitly or explicitly to a distinction between living human beings and other entities, that is, sociologists equate the social world with the world of living humans. This consensus has been questioned by only a few authors, such as Luckmann, and some scholars of science studies. According to these approaches, it would be ethnocentric to treat as self-evident the premise that only living human beings can be social actors. The methodological consequence of such critique is a radical deanthropologization of sociological research. It must be considered an open question whether or not only living human can be social actors. The paper starts with a discussion of the methodological problems posed by such an analysis of the borders of the social world, and presents the results of an empirical analysis of these borders in the fields of intensive care and neurological rehabilitation. Within these fields it must be determined whether a body is a living human body or a symbol using human body. The analysis of these elementary border phenomena challenges basic sociological concepts. The relevant contemporary sociological theories refer to a dyadic constellation as the systematic starting point of their concept of sociality. The complex relationship between at least two entities is understood as the basis of the development of a novel order that functions as a mediating structure between the involved parties. Based upon empirical data, I argue that it is necessary to change this foundational assumption. Not the dyad but the triad must be understood as the foundational constellation. This implies a new understanding of the third actor, which is distinct from the concepts developed by Simmel and Berger and Luckmann. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper comments on that article "Sociology and political arithmetic: some principles of a new policy science," by Hugh Lauder, Phillip Brown and A.H Halsey in this issue of "The British Journal of Sociology." Two key issues are addressed in a selective way. First, what is and what should be the role of social science, and sociology in particular, in informing policy making. Second, what is the wider role of social science in facilitating the democratic debate, and in holding policymakers to account. Too little social science research is directed at important issues Incentives in academia are not well aligned to achieving socially optimal goals, whether that be for inter-disciplinary working or policy influencing behavior.

The appropriateness and desirability of researching children have been issues of some debate. Children may be perceived as non-competent or vulnerable, and proxies have been used as children's representatives. Increasingly researchers are speaking to children directly. Why is this so and what are the methodological and ethical implications of researching children's views? In this paper the authors draw on their own experiences of researching children in the fields of child carers and the impact of the Child Support Act 1991. A number of social, political and legal trends are identified which form a background to the growing interest in children as potential and actual participants in the research process. The theoretical, methodological, ethical and practical issues involved are then identified and described, using examples from two separate studies conducted by the authors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The title of a collection on `ethics and methodology of research with children' implies that research with children necessarily raises unique questions about ethics and methods. Our paper questions whether this is so, what the unique questions might be and how they arise. We consider that any extra complications in research with children are common to research with other `minority' groups. The main complications do not arise from children's inabilities or misperceptions, but from the positions ascribed to children in late twentieth-century Western societies. Clarity about the social origins of any complications in research with children is crucial if these complications are to be addressed. Ethics, methods, theories, data and policy conclusions are inextricably interwoven, and it is important to acknowledge how initial theories inevitably shape policies. Reasons are given fir preferring rights-based to child-centred ethics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accomplished sciences are distinguished by an active orientation to data. Rather than explaining passive observations or even laboratory results, these sciences put a premium on creating effects or objects never before observed. Theories provide a basic for denying the data, in showing how nature can be better organized to produce some new effect or object. In this paper, a method for constructing these theories is developed A sociological application is carried out to the point where an accomplishment is claimed. A very peculiar object is discovered - a relationship. Though it does not resemble anything we may have ever observed it offers to groping actors a guide to something that works and hence could become something that is commonly observed. Likely scruples are addressed that might block the pursuit of such accomplishments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Until quite recently, questionnaire surveys, semi-structured interviews and the gathering and interpreting of various documents have been the main kinds of empirical research to be found in French sociology. Observation plays a leading role in none of them, even in the latter. The researchers who use it do not seem convinced of its legitimacy, because what can be expected from systematic observation does not fit the prevailing purpose of developing abstract, general theories. After having sketched out the institutional and intellectual background, this paper examines a few examples of French studies using observation. Most of them fail to clearly distinguish between indirect evidence and direct observation, between meaning as construed by the observer and that experienced by the people observed; they rarely report dated and situated facts (even more seldom behaviors than settings), and they replace the expected analyses of these messing facts with the interpretation of would-be typical or usual facts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]