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The article focuses on the annual meeting of the Rural Sociological society. This is not a new experience, but some of the changes that are taking place in rural sociology programs and in society indicate that the need for discussion is not yet satisfied. This is also one way of reaching the many members, subscribers, and readers who axe unable to attend the Society meetings, and of including them in the circle of discourse. Accordingly, few persons from various sections of the country and one to represent a view of rural sociology as it exists outside the U. S. to offer some of their views on important issues in the future of rural sociology were invited. They were asked to respond briefly and quickly enough for the papers to be presented in the June issue before the 1969 meeting.

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Department of Sociology, The university of Rochester, October, 1966. The paper was written while the author was on leave of absence from the Department of Sociology, Syracuse University, as a visiting scholar at the Laboratory for Social Research, Stanford University. This investigation was supported in part by a Public Health Service fellowship MH 23,804-01 from the National Institute of Mental health. Much of the background for this paper was obtained while the author was a visiting scholar at the Institute for Mathematical Studies in the Social Sciences, Stanford University (1964-1966) and the Laboratory for Social Research, Stanford University (1966-1967). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article the author presents various topics published in the Winter 1952-53 issue of the journal "Public Opinion Quarterly." In the first paper published in the issue, Paul F. Lazarsfeld expresses the hope of American sociologists that international communications research can help to fill certain methodological and substantive gaps which have not yet been successfully bridged in the domestic sphere. He stresses particularly the opportunities open in this new field for bringing social researchers and policy makers closer together in their endeavors in the area of social progress. The reader may look at this paper as an expression of mature speculation about the opportunities, hopes, and dangers in the new field. In the next two sections, the author moves into the work-a-day realm, encountering the people who, in spite of all the handicaps of an ill-defined field, unproven methods, and shortage of trained personnel, have gone ahead and contributed substantively to international communications research. In the section on "Techniques" some very pertinent problems of methodology are frankly stated. The issue is concluded by a short report on the first meeting of the Committee on International Communications Research, which took place during the last annual convention of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.

This article presents the research papers published in this issue of the journal "Rural Sociology." The first paper by James H. Copp represents a stage in the maturation of research on farm practice acceptance. It is one of the first attempts to compare the results of studies conducted in different agricultural regions. Using data from Wilkening's study in Wisconsin and from his own study in Kansas, he developed comparable measures of certain personal, social, and economic variables. Another paper by Copp and colleagues deals with the informational aspect of the acceptance of new farm practices. They attempt essentially to specify the function of information sources in the adoption process. By asking a series of questions about the sources of information at various times, from the awareness of a new practice until its adoption, they find that institutionalized sources tend to perform a function separate from that of noninstitutionalized sources. The study by Charles R. Hoffer and Dale Stangland is a worthy attempt to take into account the farmer's value orientations as they affect his adoption of practices.

This paper examines the relationship between formal and informal participation of individuals in three Pennsylvania rural communities. Data concerning the range and intensity of informal activities were used to test the hypothesis that a positive relationship exists between formal and informal participation of individuals in rural society. In general, this hypothesis was substantiated by the evidence on eighteen selected types of informal activities. However, more research is needed, not only on the roles played within various informal groups but also on participation in other areas of informal activities than those reported in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The term "relevant" within the context of a small-groups course in sociology seemed to mean participating in ongoing groups and observing and gathering data on small groups. Teaching by having students engage in research has also been advocated by articles in "The American Sociologist." The research approach is especially applicable for courses in small groups. But there are too many difficulties in having students carry out research to make research the central feature of a course. In most cases students would not be sufficiently knowledgeable to design and conduct meaningful small-group experiments. This causes problems too difficult for an untrained instructor to handle. The second reason was that while attracted to the learn-by-doing element in such a course, it was equally important to devote class time to covering theoretical concepts, research techniques, and general substantive material. According to the author, the ideal course would expose students to diverse theoretical approaches to small groups while meeting their demand for relevance in the form of group participation and involvement in research.

This article presents information on congresses and conventions on various issues held in the U.S. as of December 1916. The Twenty-ninth Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association will be held at Columbus, Ohio, December 27-30, 1916. The American Sociological Society, the American Statistical Association, and the American Association for Labor Legislation will meet at the same time and place. A meeting of the teachers of economics, sociology, and commerce, in the state of Iowa was held at the State University in Iowa City on October 6 and 7, 1916. On Wednesday evening, December 27, there will be a joint meeting of the four associations at which the annual presidents' addresses will be given. The subject for discussion at the Thursday morning session is "The Problem of Land Ownership." researcher Richard T. Ely will read the leading paper. On Thursday afternoon there will be papers by researcher H. C. Taylor on "Two Dimensions of Economic Productivity" and by researcher George von Tungein on "The Results of Some Rural Surveys in Iowa."

The article presents the report of the President presented at the annual business meeting of the American Economic Association. It presents the critical examination of the inadequacies to train physical scientists and engineers and there is quite general agreement on the need for a substantial strengthening of this aspect of our educational system. However various people who have pressed for such a strengthening have been careful to insist that it ought not to be accomplished at the expense of work in the social sciences and the humanities. It seems desirable to use the competition to encourage the balanced type of contribution that combines the deductive and empirical approach. Both the entries in the competition and the responses to the informal survey indicate a situation which is cause for grave concern. There is something wrong with the incentives under which economists work in the early stages of their careers. A systematic canvass needs to be undertaken to determine what steps should be taken these incentives so as to made studies that are both theoretical and factual more attractive than mere a priori model analysis inquiries.

Stratification in science has received extensive attention from researchers in the sociology of science. The general research strategy involves identifying certain socio-personal characteristics of scientists such as professional age, highest degree, prestige of training and affiliated institutions, and relating these characteristics to the reward systems in science. Two identifiable reward systems in science involve (1) the bestowal of honorary awards, and (2) the access to, and recognition in, the formal communication system in science. These two systems both contribute to the overall stratification of the reward system but differ on at least two counts. This paper attempts to examine the stratification of the formal communication system in American sociology as it is related to the stratification of scientists. It is found that the visible journals in sociology are consistently stratified according to criteria such as rejection rates, articles rejected but eventually published in other sociological journals, order of submission preferences of ASA meeting authors, and cross-citation patterns in articles of the journals.

The article briefs on events and other happenings taking place in the country under a section of "News and Notes" of the journal "Public Opinion Quarterly." The twenty-ninth annual conference of the American Association for Public Opinion Research will be held May 30 to June 4, 1974, on the theme of "understanding the United States." In another development, a two-year project now underway at the University of Illinois' Survey Research Laboratory will collate and synthesize present knowledge of consumer behavior gathered from various social science disciplines. The project will solicit papers from experts representing specific disciplines, and these will be reviewed and discussed at a small invitational conference prior to their publication. The Institute for Survey Research at Temple University has completed a mail survey of members of the American Psychological Association's Consumer Psychology division, with the aim of developing a more systematic understanding of ethical problems encountered by consumer psychologists.

This paper reports on the nature of the health research in progress at Ohio State University. The concern of the paper is with mental health. It discusses the reasons for undertaking health research, the objectives of such research, and the methods used. Studies completed and in process are likewise reported.

This paper reports on the nature of the health research in progress at Michigan State University. The concern of the paper is with physical health. It discusses the reasons for undertaking health research, the objectives of such research, and the methods used. Studies completed and in process are likewise reported.

This paper reports on the nature of the health research in progress at the University of Missouri. The concern of the paper is with physical health. It discusses the reasons for undertaking health research, the objectives of such research, and the methods used. Studies completed and in process are likewise reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a discussion on the tendencies in economic theory. One argues that little or nothing worth has been accomplished in theory during the last thirty years and there is little really left to do. Another says that it is just an evaluation of results and of possible tasks which textbooks in economics have furnished. For example, the subject of trade unionism is badly in need of a general, even if tentative, statement of results. The clear vision and the sense of relative values which such a text would impart should suggest to the workers in the field the tasks which are really most worth doing. Another has put forward his view that much of the economic theory has been static theory, concerned with "normal equilibria" and delicate marginal adjustments, resting on the assumptions of a fluid market where labor, capital, and goods are perfectly mobile. If these assumptions were true, money would, indeed, be a meaningless "cloak," obscuring the real forces at work. It is, moreover, quite grotesque for static theory to offer itself as a support for its own foundation. A static or "normal" theory of money and credit, resting on the notion of accomplished equilibrium, after transitional changes have been effected, misses the main point as to the function of money and credit. Static theory which assumes frictionless fluidity, misses the whole point concerning money and credit. A functional theory of money and credit must be a dynamic theory, basing itself on an analysis of friction, of transitions and the like.

The rapid changes taking place in the rural areas adjacent to cities are frequently objects of comment by observant citizens as well as by social scientists. The relevant data available regarding these changes in the United States are limited in scope and widely known, local observations are frequently reported in the press. The task of developing theory has not been ignored, although such work has been overshadowed by the accumulation of a great deal of descriptive detail. Indeed, the amount of research and theorizing in recent years makes it imperative that interested persons take time to summarize, evaluate, and synthesize accomplishments to date. This paper represents one such attempt. Attention has been deliberately restricted to ecological and demographic changes taking place in the rural sectors of satellite areas, a generic term used here to encompass all varieties of suburbs, satellite cities, fringe areas, commuters zones, and other areas under the immediate influence of the central city. This restriction results from space limitations rather than any idea that other types of change or other sectors of the satellite area are of lesser importance.

This paper was supported by funds provided through Contract No. 1410 between the Office of Economic Opportunity and the Institute for Educational Development and Contract 66-1 between the Institute for Educational Development and the Child Development Evaluation and Research Center of the University of Texas at Austin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A sample of 23 traits of city life which constitute the main part of Thorndike's composite measure of "goodness of life" in American cities has been factorized. Four factors have been isolated which seem to parallel some of the most important factors previously obtained in Cattell's comparative study of nations and also in the present writer's comparative study of states. They may thus be assumed to represent syntality-dimensions of a very general nature which apply not only to substructures within a single nation but also to different cultures. Thorndike's composite measure of "goodness of life" becomes thus an unwarranted generalization which neglects the independent variation in at least four dimensions of group life. The designation of an individual city as either "good" (high in G) or "bad" (low in G) is not feasible. The primary goal of this paper has been to bring a statistical method to the attention of the social scientist which has been originally developed in the psychology of individual differences. The present writer feels very strongly that factor analysis will be of great usefulness in the study of social patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the proceedings of the Ohio Valley Sociological Society Council Meeting, Held on Thursday, April 27, 1971, held at the Cleveland-Sheraton Hotel, Cleveland, Ohio. Resolutions concerning deceased members of the Ohio Valley Sociological Society should be published as obituaries in the Sociological Focus. Physician Olmstead reported for the publications committee. He indicated that the publications committee was currently seeking a new editor for Sociological Focus. He also reported on the number of papers submitted in the undergraduate and graduate paper competition. At the undergraduate level the committee has selected two CO. President Useem then introduced the topic of convention development It was moved that the principle of establishing an office of executive secretary, and/or business manager (which would be ad hoc for now) be approved. Such an executive secretary and/or business manager will work on the managerial issues of the society. The resolution was passed. The executive committee will designate an acting executive secretary.

This article presents several books related to sociology. "Hacia una sociologia del surco: Resultados del Sexto Congreso Nacional de Sociologia de Morelia," by Roberto Agramonte. In this small volume the distinguished professor of sociology and director of the Department of Cultural Interchange at the University of Havana summarizes succinctly the program of Mexico's Sixth National Sociological Congress and appraises with keen insight most of the major papers presented at it. "El hombre y Ia tierra en Boyacd: Bases socio-históricas para una ref orma agraria," by Orlando Fals Borda. This volume contains an intensive study of the institutionalized relations between man and the land in the Department of Boyacá, Colombia. The study was done with the aid of a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, and the English version was presented as a Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Florida. "Migraciones internas en Costa Rica," by Wilburg Jimenez Castro. Based largely upon materials gathered in the 1950 census of population, this volume contains the results of one of the most thorough going studies of rural-urban and interregional migration ever done in Latin America.

The article presents the proceedings of the annual business meeting of the Ohio valley sociological society. Don Olmstead reported for the Publications Committee. He reported on the search for a new editor, the maintenance of the publication, Sociological Focus at the University of Akron, and the exploration of future publication possibilities between the OVSS and other societies. Whereas the innovative and sematic scheme of the program produced interesting and provocative papers and discussions. Be it resolved that Chairman Marvin Olson and Program Committee members Elizabeth Mullins, and John Scanzoni be recognized for their efforts and that their universities be so informed. Whereas, the three year term of office for the following officers of the Ohio Valley Sociological Society has expired, be it resolved that the new officers and membership recognize the extraordinary efforts and contributions made by: Shailer Thomas, Secretary; Charles Westie, Treasurer; John Lindquist Editor of Sociological Focus.

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]

This article presents information about various developments related to sociology. Plans for the 1968 meeting of the Rural Sociological Society at the Somerset Hotel in Boston during August 23-26, 1968 are well under way. This year the Program Committee has divided the contributed papers section into six major areas. These are: Social Structure, which includes Small Groups, Community Structure and Development, Power Structure, Rural Organizations, and Stratification. The Social Processes area includes: Innovation and Social Change, Cooperation and Conflict, and Communication. The Population and Ecology are includes: Fertility, Mortality, Demographic Characteristics, and Locality. Authors of papers for possible inclusion in the Medical Care Section Program of the next annual meeting of the American Public Health Association to be held during November 10-15, 1968 at Detroit, Michigan, may obtain standard abstract forms from Donald C. Riedel, Associate Professor of Public Health, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut.

The article presents information on recent developments related to rural sociology in the U.S. Homer L. Hitt resigned as head of the Departments of Sociology and Rural Sociology and as associate dean of the Graduate School to become dean of Louisiana State University at New Orleans, Louisiana. On April 28-29, 1958, the first annual "Louisiana Conference on the Aging" was held on the campus. This conference was sponsored jointly by the Department of Sociology and the Louisiana Commission on the Aging. Outstanding scholars in gerontology were brought to the campus for the two-day session. Evan T. Peterson has joined the staff of the Division of Sociology and Rural Life, Mississippi State University, as assistant sociologist and assistant professor of sociology and rural life. The twentieth annual meeting of the Ohio Valley Sociological Society was held on May 1-2, 1958, in Cincinnati, Ohio. Host for the meeting was the Department of Sociology, University of Cincinnati. The 1959 meeting of the Society will be held in Columbus, Ohio.

Between 1900 and 1950, the population of the United States doubled, but during this same period the proportion of persons over 64 years of age quadrupled. In all states, aging has created problems which are becoming increasingly pressing. The Social Security program is designed to cope with certain income, health, and welfare issues; but the problem of personal adjustment in retirement is largely an individual matter. Agricultural census data indicate that many older people have retired on the land. Currently, more than 400,000 persons reach retirement age annually. Presumably many of these people plan for rural retirement. This paper examines the question of whether adjustment of retired persons is achieved in agriculture, especially under conditions as found in Florida. It is concluded that agriculture provides economic and cultural advantages for retirees, but that factors associated with constant aging tend to weaken these values, at least as related to open-country retirement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the paper on the research on sociological aspects of health. The report will describe these experiments and, in addition, will present in some detail the major steps of the study that are important to an understanding of the methodological aspects. The methodology of the current statewide health survey is actually a part of an extensive and varied research effort which is now being made in the sociology of health and health care throughout the U.S. The major purpose of the survey was to ascertain the extent of unmet need for medical attention by use of the symptoms approach among a representative sample of the population in Michigan. Other purposes were to obtain information about the availability and use of medical services, methods of paying for health care, attitudes regarding physicians and medical care, and the attributes and characteristics of people which might be related to all three of these areas.

The February issue of "The American Sociologist," carried the announcement that the 1969 Annual Meeting would be held in San Francisco, California. "Careers in Sociology," has been distributed recently to ASA members. Additional copies are available on request from the Executive Office. "Guide to Graduate Departments of Sociology, 1969," is now ready for distribution. "Sociological Methodology," 1969 may be ordered from Jossey-Bass, Inc., San Francisco. "Issues and Trends in Sociology," a new series of readers, will he devoted to topics of salient theoretical or substantive interest and, to the extent feasible, papers will be drawn from ASA publications. The American Sociological Association recognizes the important contributions that the National Institute of Mental Health has made to sociological training and research through its Training Grant and Social Science research programs. The Association expresses its full support of these efforts, and urges that the programs he expanded with full financial support to continue to meet the growing needs of sociological knowledge in the United States.

This article presents report of the editor of the journal "Social Problems." Editors of the journal have attempted to create a specialized journal of high scientific and literary quality in which the reader will encounter significant hypotheses and data concerning the pressing problems of contemporary time. The author states that the journal is interested both in analyses of social problems and in the application of social science theory and research to their solution. The ideal paper, in the journal's view, is one which combines problem-focus, forceful writing, theoretical sophistication, data obtained by valid research methods, and compelling logic. Above all, it should make some addition to existing knowledge. While some papers will be predominantly theoretical and others primarily empirical, the journal look for theory which can be empirically tested and data which have theoretical relevance. Editors of the journal are pleased to find that they are attracting manuscripts by authors in universities and research organizations from all regions of the United States and from a surprising number of foreign countries, including, both Israel and Egypt.

The maintenance of original value orientations and of pristine character is a crucial problem area encountered by institutions, particularly in the face of changing external or internal social circumstances. The tensions engendered in such conditions are clearly evident in sects, which provide a valuable institutional type for analysis, in that they have an explicit value commitment, are clearly circumscribed organizations, and are peculiarly self-conscious of their relations with the wider society. Some sects are markedly successful in the preservation of undiluted values of protest; others, notably those which gradually become denominationalized, are much less so. This paper seeks to distinguish and characterize distinctive types of sect, and to use such characterizations to determine the specific elements, and combinations of elements, which promote or retard such development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the Base Map as a device for community study. Base Map is a cross section of a given region, giving a snapshot of some particular set of facts within that area. It is intended to show graphically the geographical distribution and relationship of these facts. In laying out a plan of study for any community it becomes apparent that there is certain basic information which will be called for time and again in connection with various studies. Some method of getting this foundation data into graphic and easily available form is needed. In Cincinnati the base map was called into action to provide a way of doing this. The procedure in the making of these maps is so simple that no especial technical skill is required. Chief points upon which care is required are in obtaining accurate information from authoritative source, and the exercise of patience and exactness in the plotting of the data. Ordinarily a bound index accompanies each map to give further information supplementary to the map itself.

The behaviorist, neo-positivist school of sociology in the United States, with its emphasis upon mathematical symbolization, has gained many cohorts during the last quarter of a century, but it is only latterly that it has found a champion to present its tenets systematically and in full panoply. If this paper directs itself almost exclusively to one representative of this school which has so many followers, it is because the presentation of its case is both most recent and most thorough. Indeed, it should be a source of deep gratification that the position of this school of thought has finally been placed upon a full canvas, and been offered for popular showing. Only thus could both its merits and demerits be made obvious. For two decades, in a series of publications long and short, professor George Lundberg, erstwhile president of the American Sociological Society, has carried on a campaign for scientific method in the social sciences, and particularly sociology. The kind of world Lundberg wants is one in which the social scientist will be accepted as the final authority in informing men of how they can achieve the goals they set for themselves without himself approving or disapproving of these goals.

The article presents comments of economists Christopher Green, Lester C. Thurow and Harold W. Gutherie on research related to poverty research and income distribution conducted by various researchers. Green comments on Edward C. Budd and Daniel B. Radner's paper by arguing that the construction of a comprehensive income size distribution by synthesizing Current Population Survey (CPS) data and information from income tax returns should fill a serious void created by inconsistent estimates of the size distribution of income based on existing surveys of family income. The main objective of the New Jersey investigation was to learn more about the labor supply effects of negative taxes. Gutherie comments that the Budd-Radner paper is concerned with the accuracy of factual knowledge of income distribution. The paper by James N. Morgan and James D. Smith proposes the elements of a new theory of measuring welfare while that of Harold W. Watts outlines an experiment designed to test an important policy proposed to alleviate poverty.

This is a report from project No.5-0074 (EO-191), "Socioeconomic Background and Occupational Achievement: Extensions of a basic Model." Supported by Contract No.OE-5-85-072 with the U.S. Office of Education. It was prepared with the assistance of David L. Featherman, J. Michael Coble, and Elliot Long. In kindly making available the data use din the report, professor Charles F. West ff of Princeton university assumes, of course, no responsibility for the interpretations of those data offered here. A preliminary version of this paper, entitled "Motives and Mobility," was presented at the 1967 annual meeting of the American Sociological Association. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is the analysis of the interactional patterns of Wisconsin farm couples with their parents. Step-wise multiple regression analysis provides a technique to solve a sequence of one or more multiple linear models by step-wise application of the least sum-of-squares method. The predictor variables used in this analysis include: distance, husband's age, stage in the family life-cycle, husband's education, wife's education, gross farm income, agricultural training of the husband, productive-man-work-units, and level of living. The results showed that distance is an important factor in the interaction between generations in rural areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of religious experience provides an example of those strange discontinuities which seem to beset the social sciences. The present paper Is intended as a beginning of this conceptual task. There is an attempt to develop some basic sub-types and ordering dimensions for organizing the variety of experiences to which men attach religious definitions. The conceptual scheme has been informed by data from a sample of Protestant and Roman Catholic church members residing in the San Francisco Bay Area, California. These data include both quantifiable and qualitative information on the religious experiences of respondents. Where appropriate, these data will be introduced both to indicate the relative frequency of different forms of religious experience and to illustrate how people perceive such experiences. Following many previous writers, it has been suggested that the essential element characterizing religious experience, and distinguishing it from all other human experience, is some sense of contact with a supernatural agency.

This article presents information about various meetings and announcements as of August 1938. The American Catholic Sociological Society was organized at Loyola University, Chicago, on March 26, 1938, by seventy-five teachers of sociology representing thirty Catholic universities and colleges of ten states. Its purpose is to promote unity and cooperation among Catholic educators and institutions of higher learning in the field of social thought and action. The Chicago Recreation Commission and Northwestern University have recently issued Commercial Recreation, Volume II of the five-volume Survey, which deals with performing arts, sports, health, travel, newspaper promotional activities, amusement parks and endurance contests, ballrooms and dancing schools, and, briefly and quantitatively, with liquor establishments, commercialized vice, and borderline recreational activities. The Mid-West Sociological Society, held its annual meeting at Des Moines, Iowa, April 21-23, with over 100 persons from 43 institutions in attendance.

It has been apparent for some time that young intellectuals are in search of a new radicalism. In the social sciences, the search so far has pricked the surface of journals and collected papers but has not been enshrined in a major book. Marking the decline of ideology in the western world. The moral crisis of the war was not so profound in the United States; one does not hear the call to deliver on the pledge of a better world that was made then. In the United States, one must reach back to the Depression for a comparable shock and source of commitment. It may be inevitable that new radicals should challenge those they find entrenched. There is no problem in that. The problem is that the new radicals have so far found a posture of commitment and a rhetoric of conflict but not a program. One element of a program seems to be gaining currency. The idea that poor people should be helped to organize themselves, even if it brings them into conflict with governmental or other authority, is appealing for several reasons. Self-organization calls forth a vision that is as American as the bald eagle; independence and civic responsibility are its attributes.

During the past year, the American Sociological Society has continued its steady growth. There are, for example, 5,462 members now, as compared with 2,673 in the reorganization year, 1949. Among these, there are now 2,480 active members, as against 1,352 in 1949. Income from dues, estimated to be more than three times greater in 1958 than in 1949, is now actually running ahead of these estimates, partly because of intensive efforts this year to bring in new members, and partly because many present members have been more punctilious than usual in paying their dues. Thus the Society will enter its new phase of revised program and organization with a broad base of support within the profession. Not only are members more numerous they seem also to become steadily more active in their roles as members. Abstracts of papers for the annual meeting have reached a volume where printing is more efficient than mimeographing. Correspondence between members and the Executive Office mounts more rapidly than the staff has been able to expand to take care of it promptly.

The article discusses issues related to subjective powerlessness in the U.S. The paper focuses on changes since 1952 in citizen efficacy or feelings of control over government for various sub-groups in the U.S. population such as blacks, blue collar workers, Southerners, Jews, young and old people. As with most issues in the study of social change, there is widespread disagreement on trends in citizen efficacy for industrial societies such as the U.S. Most theory predicts trends in objective powerlessness, rather than subjective powerlessness, although it is possible that trends in objective powerlessness do not match trends in subjective powerlessness. Within the U.S. at each point of observation, powerlessness does not vary much by stratum, except when education and race are used as indicators. And within the white population, some of the differences are heavily explained by educational differentials. It therefore seems fair to conclude that white subordinate interest groups are not oriented toward government as a result of what would seem to be objective powerlessness but more on the basis of their educational achievement.

There are several reasons to believe that white southerners have not been active in research on topics about black Americans. Blacks themselves have certainly not been accepted with open arms when calling attention to problems of blacks. For example, in 1927, E. Franklin Frazier, a writer wrote an article in which he used an analogy comparing the mental processes of racially prejudiced persons with insane persons. Subsequently, he was chased out of Atlanta, Georgia. A study was conducted on origins of researchers on Black Americans. One of the most interesting findings is that obtaining the highest college degree in a southern state of the U.S. does not produce as much of a tendency to study blacks as do childhood socialization or institutional affiliation in the South. One hypothesis is that graduate programs neutralize a tendency to deal with blacks that other socially connected experiences seem to enhance. What seems more likely is that the restrictive social climate of the South may be responsible for the relatively meager opportunities for academic specialization at the research level in southern graduate schools. It is likely, however, that the long trend is reversing. Southern sociologists, who have been criticized for not doing enough research on blacks, have actually been doing proportionately more research in this field than in other fields as compared with their northern, including western counterparts.

The article presents analysis that must be seen as a case study of persistence and change of some of the theories and practices of social anthropologists. They clearly mark the cross roads to a new orientation that focuses on people, instead of on institutions and groups; on how individuals try to construct a social reality, instead of on how they are molded by society; on dynamic configurations, instead of on static forms, on the essential unity of individual and society, instead of on their polarity. Anthropologists, in contrast to sociologists, have indicated relatively little interest in examining their profession and its theoretical assumptions as objects of research. The article attempts to indicate why the Radcliffe-Brownian orientation given by sociologist A.R. Radcliffe-Brown still persists and to explain why there has been a change in orientation for many. Except in the United States, the concern of anthropologists with their own discipline as an object of study began only in the late 1960s. In contrast, by the late 1930s American sociologists had established the sociology of science as a separate academic discipline. Anthropologists have essentially been concerned with questions of what makes social order possible and how it is maintained. The framework that author have used, provides insights into how the paradigms in discipline generated, become dominant and, ultimately, are replaced. Since the formulation of scientific theory is in part a social process, author may also have gained insights into the way this process is speeded up or slowed down.

Self-analysis and self-awareness are one of the essential paradigms of policy sciences [1]. Constant monitoring of the development of policy sciences approaches (never mind their name) in different countries is, therefore, essential. It not only helps to build up a "sociology of policy studies," but permits learning-feedback, and thus guides the advancement of policy sciences during its critical formative periods. Also, comparative exchanges of experience and cross-cultural communication are helpful to building up the profession of policy scientists and providing mutual support for often difficult efforts. To encourage detailed writing and study on the development of policy sciences activities, I want to discuss in this short note some of the main variables which seem to shape the development of policy sciences approaches, with special attention to activities outside the United States. Based on personal impressions and on discussions with colleagues in a number of countries, my analysis is suggestive at best. But it may serve to identify at least some relevant features and thus constitute a starting point for more thorough treatment of the subject within specific contexts by authors active in the advancement of policy sciences in various countries. This note will not discuss institutional features of the growth of policy sciences [2]. Rather, I will discuss a number of variables one by one [3], in no particular order and without trying at this stage to order the variables within an overall model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents news briefs on several social science publications as of December 1972. The 1972 edition of the book "Statistical Abstract of the United States," was issued by the U.S. Bureau of Census. This 93rd annual edition of the "Abstract" includes a more comprehensive section of statistics from the 1970 U.S. Census of Population and Housing than was possible in 1971. "Current Research" booklet published in English, is now available from the Centre for European Society. The American Academy of Political and Social Science will publish a special monograph of papers and proceedings presented at a two day conference on Integration of the Social Sciences Through Policy Analysis.

This article presents updates on the American Sociological Association (ASA) in the U.S. as of December 1972. Sociology of Education will sponsor a special session of contributed student papers at the 68th Annual Meeting of the ASA in New York City on August 27 to 30, 1973. Peter Blau, Ralph Turner, Roscoe Hinkle, Erving Goffman and Gerhard Lenski were elected as officers of the Theoretical Sociology Section of the ASA for the 1973 year.

The Southern Sociological Society held its Seventeenth Annual Meeting at the Atlanta Biltmore, Atlanta, Georgia, March 25-27, 1954. Section meetings, with their presiding officers, were: Theory and Methodology, Abbott L. Ferriss and Homer L. Hitt; Social Work and Public Welfare, Dorothy Jones; Race and Culture Contacts, Edgar T. Thompson; The Teaching of Sociology, Marion B. Smith; Social Psychology, Robert C. Stone; and Population and Ecology, Lorin A. Thompson. Guy B. Johnson delivered the presidential address, "A Sociologist Looks at Racial Desegregation in the South." Officers elected for 1954-55 were: President, Morton B. King, University of Mississippi; President- Elect, Irwin T. Sanders, University of Kentucky; First Vice-President, Edgar T. Thompson, Duke University; Second Vice-President, Lorin A. Thompson, University of Virginia; Secretary-Treasurer, Melvin J. Williams, Stetson University. James S. Himes, North Carolina College, and Meyer F. Nimkoff, Florida State University, were elected to serve three-year terms on the Executive Committee; C. A. McMahan, Maxwell Air Force Base, was elected to serve out a vacated two-year term as a member of the Executive Committee; and William E. Cole, University of Tennessee, was elected representative to the American Sociological Society.

The article highlights the concept of political economy coined by well-known socio-economist Horace Greeley. Historians of economic thought, in customarily appointing Henry C. Carey dean of the American School, have generally neglected the high spokesman of discontent, Horace Greeley, founder and editor of the "New York Tribune." Horace Greeley's life and political economy stand out as clearer expressions of a young America in its middle period transition. Greeley was an awakened figure of his time. Never the totally eccentric dreamer he is frequently considered, he found himself aware that narrow parochialisms were breaking up, and he aimed to conform society to the changes under way. He saw his country as the great chance for righting wrongs- and he wished to make it a proving ground for social experimentation. Thus, he devoted his life and his paper to teaching the people to seek freedom by building a wealthy nation in which resources should be correctly utilized and special privileges should be destroyed.

Presents news notes involving the Rural Sociological Society in the U.S. Announcements by sociological institutions; Programs and projects involving universities and colleges; Meetings and workshops.

A plea is made for the current need to consider carefully exactly what Is meant by the term "rural". It is suggested that, while ambiguity in usage prevails, most understandings involve ecological, occupational, or cultural dimensions in some measure. By taking each of these three broad classes of variables separately as the defining characteristic of "rurality", some of the strengths and weaknesses of each in terms of logic, scientific needs, professional precedents, and the demands from the larger society for pragmatic operation in the discipline are set down. While incomplete, the specification and analysis of the alternative lines of meaning are offered as a step in the necessary direction of clarifying the concept "rural". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article, which is concerned with delineating clienteles of the Agricultural Extension Service (AES) program in the U.S. within value-orientation and attitude frames of reference, is directed towards the goal of knowing the audience. In reference to a study regarding the social patterns of farming, it has been suggested that there are clienteles, rather than a single clientele, for extension programs. This information may be useful in the work of research and extension personnel in rural sociology. To represent clienteles of the AES, this study is divided into three sections. The first part deals with Cecil County, Maryland farmers' verbalizations of ideas accepted from county agent work. The second section uses data from the meetings study on farmers' expressed preferences for new subject matter. For the last one, Cecil County farmers are categorized into provisional clienteles to establish whether attitudes expressed toward county agents' efforts differ between clienteles. In conclusion, three types of clientele are identified: farmers who lack an orientation toward contemporary programs in agricultural education; farmers' conception of a new idea that differs from the extension worker's conception; and farmers who are oriented toward accepting new ideas and whose conception of a new idea is consistent with the extension worker's conception.

Library users, in comparison with non-library users, spend more time reading; read more magazines regularly; read more books; have more books in the home; and are more interested in various types of reading matter, In addition, they are better educated, belong to more organizations, and rank higher in the socio-economic indices. This may indicate that the library is associating itself with members of the upper social classes, and is neglecting a large potential reading public in the lower classes. This thesis is partly corroborated by the fact that the reading behavior of families of leaders, whether users of the library or not, tends to parallel that of families of the cross-section sample who use this library. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a discussion on the article 'The Social Effects of Recent Trends in the Mechanization of Agriculture,' written by social scientist C. Horace Hamilton. Hamilton has pointed out that the accelerated rate at which it has been taking place during recent years is something new. Since adjustment to changing conditions is usually more difficult when changes come about abruptly, and since technological change on farms has been very rapid in recent years, one should not be surprised that social maladjustments of a serious nature are already apparent. If the social problems created by mechanization where it has already proceeded much further than in most rural areas, are typical of the problems likely to be encountered in many other areas as mechanization increases, it would seem that social scientists should be studying this vanguard of problems carefully. Mechanization of agriculture in the U.S. reduces considerably the requirements for manpower on the farms of the nation and rightly raises the question as to what will happen to farm families displaced by machines.