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The article reports that if a family of items is divided into two mutually exclusive classes it is economical to define the more complex class in terms of the less complex one. For the purpose of this experiment the 'complexity' of a class is defined in terms of the number of discriminably different members included within it. The 'relative class complexity,' or ratio, of two classes is the number of members in the smaller class to the number of members in the larger class. As the ratio of the complexity of two classes approaches unity any advantages of definition by exclusion should diminish; At some ratio less than unity the advantages of definition in terms of the less complex class should be balanced by the disadvantages of definition by exclusion. These considerations only apply when a response is to be made to the members of one class but not to members of the other since if both classes are associated with their own response the instructions can always be transformed in such a way as to allow the subject to work in terms of the least complex class defined by inclusion.

The article presents study that is designed to ascertain which attitudinal and structural factors influence white-collar workers to form positive attitudes toward and/or to join unions. The general consensus in the literature is that favorable attitudes toward unionism are a function of job dissatisfaction. Dissatisfaction may be with the job as a whole, specific job factors and/or various socio-cultural conditions. Dissatisfaction with life accomplishments, political liberalism, previous contact with unions and job insecurity are other factors found to be related to a tendency to join unions. Thus, the acceptance of an office union seems to be related to a worker's belief that the union will help ameliorate some undesirable working conditions or help him to achieve a desired goal. There is some evidence that the more satisfied employees prefer to join an employee association while the most dissatisfied prefer a union. A worker may be reluctant to join a union because he feels that it may interfere with his chances for advancement based upon individual initiative, skill and ability. Negative attitudes have been found to be a function of class identification, management identification, position and job level.