Items Vol. 12 No. 3 (1958)

SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH COUNCIL

VOLUME 12 . NUMBER 3 • SEPTEMBER 1958 230 PARK AVENUE NEW YORK 17, N. Y.

REPORT ON THE WORK OF THE COUNCIL'S COMMITTEE ON HISTORICAL ANALYSIS

To SOCIAL scientists accustomed to dividing science into descriptive and analytical functions, the term "historical analysis" might imply that a Committee on Historical Analysis would from the outset be committed to the study of the process by which history might become a nomothetic science. To historians accustomed to think­ing of historical method as being first a process of analysis of testimony for credible details and then a synthesis of those details into a plausible context, the same term may seem to mean that a Committee on Historical Analysis would be primarily interested in the careful assessment of particulars without concern for their subsequent synthesis.

This confusion is all to the good, because the Coun­cil's committee early decided that it had no desire to indicate a preference for history either as a study of the unique or as a study of the general. Nevertheless its members agreed unanimously that historians, like all other word-using humans, do in fact generalize, though some do so implicitly or unconsciously rather than ex­plicitly, and that they would do so (or, if they preferred, avoid doing so) with greater intelligence and usefulness if they made a deliberate effort to be aware of and to examine the generalizations that they were in fact employing. The committee therefore became primarily

• The author, Professor of Modern History at the University of Chi­cago, is chairman of the Committee on Historical Analysis and a mem­ber of the board of directors of the Council. The present account is his Annual Report to the Council on the progress of the committee's work. The other members of the committee are: w. O. Aydelotte, State Uni­versity of Iowa; Thomas C. Cochran, University of Pennsylvania; Merle Cuni, University of Wisconsin; Roy F. Nichols, University of Pennsyl­vania; and David M. Potter, Yale University.

by Louis Gottschalk ...

concerned with the problem of making the historian self-conscious about his use or abuse of generalizations. It felt, besides, that more light would be shed on its problem by consideration of generalizations in connec­tion with substantive historical data than by considera­tion of historical generalizations in the abstract.

In the two years of its existence the committee has gone through three phases. At first, anxious to avoid any imputation that it was trying to oblige historians to be social scientists, it adopted tlle principle of merely keep­ing informed about and encouraging the efforts of others to examine the problem of generalization. Dur­ing this phase the committee was in part responsible for two conferences in June 1957-a conference at Stanford University on generalizations regarding the history of large-scale communities and another at Rutgers Univer­sit yon generalizations regarding the history of American political behavior. Members of the committee took part in both these conferences as well as a third, at the Annual Meeting of the American Historical Association in 1957, on the causes of the American Civil War. It soon seemed likely that, if this procedure were to result in a set of essays, they would be a disjointed set, refighting national crises, presidential elections, the Civil War, and similar debatable subjects. They would perhaps astutely indi­cate the abuse of generalizations in past debates about such historical episodes, but might not lead to useful generalizations about the process itself of historical generalization.

The committee then thought that perhaps it ought to select for its own consideration a single historical devel­opment, with a view to examining the generalizations

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and comparative propositions that had come out of the study of that development. It agreed upon the concept of national character as a good subject for such an ex­amination, and contemplated asking interested specialists in the other social sciences to meet with it in order to extend and intensify the critique of the historians' gen­eralizations about national character. Further reflection, however, led to dropping this approach, out of the ap­prehension that it might lead to a series of debates on national character or a set of essays by nonhistorians criticizing the historians' concept of national character, all of which might have intrinsic merit but might not deal directly and explicitly with the assumed tendency of historians to generalize and with what, if anything, to do about that tendency.

CURRENT PROGRAM OF THE COMMITTEE

The committee therefore embarked upon a third, its present, phase: It selected mature historians who had worked intensively on some important phases of history and who in the course of their study must have become familiar with the conflicting literature and interpreta­tions of their fields, and invited them to write essays, which, setting forth some of the generalizations found in that literature, would undertake a critique indicating which generalizations in their judgment were wholly valid, partly valid, or wholly invalid, and why. In this way the committee hopes eventually to have in hand a set of essays dealing with the problem of the historians' generalizations in several different contexts and from sev­eral varying points of view. From those essays as a point of departure it may then be in a position to consult other social scientists about the general problem.

Of five historians invited to undertake the desired essays three accepted: Walter P. Metzger of Columbia University, Robert R. Palmer of Princeton, and Arthur F. Wright of Stanford. Fortunately they are well dis­tributed among the important areas of history-being, respectively, an American historian, a modern European historian, and an orientalist. In order to suggest without dictating to these authors the lines along which the com­mittee had been thinking, each was sent a definition of history that seemed acceptable for the committee's pur­poses 1 and a "loose and tentative" outline of the prob-

1 "The historian deals with people as individuals or as aggregates acting in relation to other individuals or aggregates, responding with more or less freedom to forces in the natural or man-made environ­ment, and motivated to follow a course of thought or action, often in preference to alternative courses of thought or action-with the result that certain manifest developments occur. These manifestations take place in a specific context of culture and institutions and modify it or are modified by it, thus bringing about historical change. The his­torian also frequently draws conclusions, if not on the value and wisdom

lems of generalization as seen by the committee. The major headings in this outline were: (1) Levels of gen­eralization used; (2) Kinds of generalization used; (3) Sources of the generalizations used; (4) Subjects of gen­eralization; (5) Critique of the generalizations used; (6) Suggestions for testing the validity of these and similar generalizations. The prospective author was informed that he was free to use his own judgment how best to employ the suggested outline or any part of it.

At a meeting on June 2, 1958, the committee was able to consider three papers. One of these was by Robert R. Palmer and was entitled "The Historian's Use of Generalizations," and two were by Arthur F. Wright. Of those two, one had been prepared especially for the committee and was entitled "On the Origins and Uses of Certain Generalizations in the Study of Chinese His­tory: A Sketch for a Paper"; the other had been pre­pared for another purpose and was entitled "The Study of Chinese Civilization." Since Wright's first article was in part dependent upon the second, both were made available for the committee's consideration.

Palmer's paper, concerned with the problems of gen­eralization that he had encountered in the preparation of his own forthcoming book, elicited oral and written comments that may lead to further consideration, among other things, of a particularly crucial issue: Should the historian, or can he usefully, make generalizations of universal validity? Are not his efforts better directed to the examination and rejection, verification, or modifica­tion of already available general and comparative con­cepts relevant to his subject of research? If his investiga­tion leads him to confirm old concepts or to affirm new ones about his subject, ought he to leave to others the serious investigation as to how far they may be applicable to other subjects of historical study?

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Wright's papers raised, among other things, the prob­lems encountered when investigators from one culture attempt to understand the history of another. He indi­cated the dangers of misguidance both from the con­cepts (whether mere word translations, stylized interpre­tations, or broad deterministic hypotheses) brought to the investigation by the investigator and from those found by him in the culture under investigation. He pointed out also the lack in the West of accurate or sufficient data about many areas of Chinese history-a situation which made it desirable on the one hand to fill in tlle gaps with tentative hypotheses of a general nature, and difficult on the other to propound general hypotheses of enduring validity.

of given courses of thought or action, at least on their elIectiveness and consequences." (The definition is almost entirely the composition of David Potter.)

Since the June meeting some progress has been made. Correspondence among the committee's members and the authors has produced a number of challenging ques­tions and comments relevant to its problem. In addition, David S. Nivison of Stanford University has sent them (with his compliments) a list of books and articles on the philosophy of history that have appeared since the publication of the Selected Reading List in Council Bulletin 54, Theory and Practice in Historical Study: A Report of the Committee on Historiography (1946). Walter P. Metzger is engaged in preparation of his paper

for the committee, which will deal with generalizations by historians around a single theme-that of national character. Thus the committee hopes to have for its con­sideration at its next meeting the discussions that have resulted from Palmer's presentation of the problems that a single historian copes with in making generalizations, and from Wright's presentation of the problems that historians from one culture cope with in making gen­eralizations about another, as well as Metzger's presen­tation of the problem that historians in general en­counter when dealing with common or similar subjects.

COLLEGE INFLUENCES ON PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT: REPORT OF A RESEARCH PLANNING CONFERENCE

WITH the large and increasing numbers of persons at­tending college, it is important to know as much as pos­sible about the impact of the college experience on the developing personality and subsequent life patterns of the students. Over and above the imparting of knowl­edge and skills, and the preparation for occupational roles, the effects of college as a cultural institution in the socialization process are largely unknown and merit careful study. To what extent does a college modify or support the values and goals of its students? How does it influence the particular interests and attitudes of its graduates? Does college promote conformity or freedom; bigotry or tolerance; conservatism or change? And for each question that can be asked about college experience in general, there are a host of questions about the dif­ferent kinds of college experience that affect different students in different ways.

Recognizing the potential contribution of research to these questions, the Social Science Research Council in October 1957 appointed a new Committee on Person­ality Development in Youth.1 The committee held its second meeting on March 25-26 at the Center for Ad­vanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in Stanford. In addition to committee members the following guests were present: Frank Barron and Lloyd Morrisett, Jr. of the University of California, Berkeley; Dyke Brown,

1 The members of the committee are Ralph 'V. Tyler, Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (chairman); Dana L. Farns­worth, Harvard University; T. R. McConnell, University of California, Berkeley; Theodore M. Newcomb, University of Michigan; C. Robert Pace, Syracuse University; Nevitt Sanford, University of California, Berkeley; and Robin M. Williams, Jr., Cornell University; staff, Donald G. Marquis.

by Donald G. Marquis

Ford Foundation; Richard Christie, Columbia Univer­sity; and Ronald Lippitt, University of Michigan. Fol­lowing a discussion of the current work and interests of the participants, the group formulated a number of gen­eral objectives for committee activity: (I) a summary and review of knowledge and methods in the field, in the form of an annotated bibliography, symposium, mono­graph, or some combination of these; (2) stimulation and facilitation of research at educational institutions on per­sonality development, perhaps by conducting a summer training institute; (3) development of concepts and measures useful in such research, for example, in a small summer seminar; and (4) encouragement of comparative study at different institutions. It was decided to employ the funds available for use by the committee in pursuit of the above objectives, and not to undertake a program of grants-in-aid of research.

As a next step in organizing its program the commit­tee sponsored a conference of research workers actively engaged in the conduct or planning of investigations of the personality and life patterns of alumni who had been studied during their college years. This conference was held at the University of Michigan on June 23-28. The participants included the following psychologists, soci­ologists, and educators: Ralph W. Tyler, Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (chairman); Robert C. Birney and Haskell R. Coplin, Amherst Col­lege; James S. Davie and Ernst Prelinger, Yale Univer­sity; Robert A. Ellis, Stanford University; Starke R. Hathaway, University of Minnesota; Jean Macfarlane, Donald W. MacKinnon, and Nevitt Sanford, Univer­sity of California, Berkeley; Charles C. McArthur, Har-

27

vard University; Bernice Neugarten, University of Chicago; Gerard G. Neuman, Illinois Social Welfare Foundation; Theodore M. Newcomb, University of Michigan; Walter T. Plant, San Jose State College; Esther Raushenbush, Sarah Lawrence College; Morris Rosenberg, National Institute of Mental Health; and Donald G. Marquis, Social Science Research Council. The general purpose of the sessions was to exchange in­formation about current research, to discuss plans for future studies by the participants, and to find, if possible, some common concepts and measures that could be used in a number of studies to facilitate comparisons and broader interpretations.

RESEARCH IN PROGRESS

The discussions by the work group, together with earlier ones by the committee, indicated clearly the in­adequacy of present knowledge of the effects of different college environments on the developing attitudes, in­terests, values, and life styles of students. In a compre­hensive review of research on Changing Values in CollegeJ

2 Jacob found only two dozen studies of change in characteristics of students during their college years. Several of the studies spanned only one year, and others were based on use of a single test measure. Comprehen­sive studies of student change have been or are being carried out at Bennington College, by Theodore M. Newcomb; at Sarah Lawrence College, by Esther Raushenbush; at Princeton University, by Frederick F. Stephan; at Vassar College, by Nevitt Sanford; at Cornell University, by Edward Suchman, Robin M. Williams, Jr., and Rose Goldsen; and at Amherst College, by Haskell R. Coplin, Robert C. Birney, and others. Com­parably extensive studies are now being planned at Har­vard University by Dana Farnsworth; at Yale by Bryant Wedge, James S. Davie, and Ernst Prelinger; at the Uni­versity of California, Berkeley, by T. R. McConnell; and more limited studies are being planned at a few other institutions. Several comprehensive researches on chang­ing characteristics of medical students are in progress.

PROBLEMS IN DESIGNING RESEARCH

The scope and difficulty of systematic research in this field are immediately apparent, and the requirements for a satisfactory research design are indeed formidable. Measurement of student change in the college environ­ment calls for longitudinal study with assessment at the beginning and end of the period in college and prefer­ably at intermediate points to determine the nature and

2 Philip E. Jacob. Changing T'alues in College, New York: Harper &:

Brothers. 1957.

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amount of influence at different stages. More than one class should be followed in order to avoid the confound­ing effects of major contemporary events and general cultural changes on the measurement of the student changes. Follow-up studies after graduation, with all the difficulties and expense of locating and studying a scat­tered population, are necessary to evaluate the persist­ence of the college influences and their consequences in later life.

The nature of the college experience, of course, varies greatly from one institution to another, and within the same institution from one subculture to another. A stu­dent who lives in a fraternity house is exposed to en­vironmental influences very different from those affect­ing one who lives at home or in a dormitory. Before it will be possible to draw general conclusions from scien­tific studies it will be necessary to characterize and categorize the different cultural environments. Many impressions of these environments are now a part of our folklore (e.g., "Illinois is more athletics-minded than Chicago"; "Princeton is more conservative than Anti­och"; "Harvard is a quite different college for different students"), and there is great need for systematic descrip­tion. Robert Pace at Syracuse University is developing a multiple-item inventory by which students, faculty, and administrators can characterize the actual informal culture with its norms, prescriptions, sanctions, and rewards.

We do not know what aspects of college life are most significant in influencing students: Books, courses, fac­ulty, friends, independence, or what? There is a growing awareness of the importance of the peer group in de­termining the nature of the college culture for any stu­dent. The admissions policies of colleges, and the self­selection in applications and dropouts result in great diversity among the students at different colleges. And since tllere is effective pressure in social groups generally, and in college specifically, toward conformity to group norms, it follows that a student will be influenced in directions determined by the composition of the student body. Jacob emphasizes the leveling effect of college on student values: "There is more homogeneity and greater consistency of values among students at the end of their four years than when they begin. Fewer seniors espouse beliefs which deviate from the going standards than do freshmen." And in another connection he points out that "the intellectual, cultural or moral climate of some insti­tutions stands out from the crowd ... where there is such unity and vigor of expectation, students seem drawn to live up to the college standard, even if it means quite a wrench from their previous ways of thought." 3

The documented differences in student populations at 31bid., pp. 6. 10-11.

different colleges also place important limitations on comparison of the products of these colleges. For ex­ample, the interpretation of the findings of Knapp and collaborators 4 on the differing rates of production of scientists and scholars has been challenged by Holland,o whose studies of National Merit Scholars indicate that differences among the colleges can be largely accounted for in terms of the differences in ability of the students at the time of entrance to college. We are left with the implication that the "superiority" of a college may oper­ate through its attractiveness to superior students.

Individual differences among students introduce an­other set of variables which must be considered in plan­ning research on college influences. The "same" college culture may have quite different effects on two students of different basic personality or with different life ex­periences. The importance of socioeconomic status, parent expectations, and identification with parents was emphasized in discussions at the Ann Arbor conference. Participants agreed on the desirability of assessing the students' personality and background initially by means of standardized methods that would yield data com­parable from one study to another.

Measures of individual differences cannot be expected to yield direct prediction of change in college, but at best a prediction based on the interaction of personali ty characteristics with the particular type of college ex­perience. The most important predictor may be some feature of concordance or discrepancy between the indi­vidual and the college. In this area of knowledge may lie a prospect of improved bases for guiding students' selec­tion of colleges and programs within a college, as well as designing special educational programs for different kinds of students.

Follow-up studies of the persistence or consequences of individual changes during college are almost non­existent. There are many surveys comparing college graduates with nongraduates in respect to a wide variety of characteristics, but such studies do not include any data on the effect of the experience as measured by change during college. It is known. for example, that some college students come to value religion more, and others to value it less; that institutions differ in this in­fluence; and that many graduates show shifts in one or the other direction when studied after fifteen years. But the relevant studies were based on different samples, and there is no way to infer whether a college had any

• R. H. Knapp and H. n. Goodrich, Origins of American Scientists, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1952: R. H. Knapp and J. J. Greenbaum, The Younger American Scholar: His Collegiate Origins, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1953.

5 John L. Holland, "Undergraduate Origins of American Scientists," Science, September 6, 1957, pp. 433-437.

lasting influence upon the later religious beliefs and practices of its graduates. The current studies at Vassar and Princeton, and the projected follow-up of students studied twenty years ago at Bennington and Sarah Lawrence will provide the first systematic data on such questions. The extensive materials collected in some of the classic longitudinal studies carried out by child de­velopment centers may offer possibilities for explora­tory analysis of college influences.

A major difficulty in research design is the problem of demonstrating that changes occurring between freshman and senior years may be attributed to the college ex­perience. It does not seem feasible to compose a control group of persons similar to college samples but who do not go to college. The outlook, however, is not hopeless. It is important to generalize about people who do go to college, and even more valuable to study the different kinds of changes in similar students who enter different educational environments.

NATURE OF COLLEGE INFLUENCES

Attempts to designate the particular attitudes, values, motives, and personality characteristics most appropriate for study were extensively discussed by the work group. Such dependent variables ideally would show an effect during college, would vary with type of student, would be important in the sense of making a difference in later life, and would be capable of satisfactory measurement.

Several general approaches can be recognized. One approach is in terms of the educational objectives of col­leges as stated in catalogs and commencement addresses. Such objectives, however, do not bear any necessary re­lation to actual college influences, and are not usually formulated so as to suggest specific methods of measuring them. A better idea of the objectives of the college may be gained by asking faculty and administrators to de­scribe the characteristics of an ideal student.

A second approach is the empirical one of discovering what changes actually occur. On the basis of measured differences between first- and fourth-year students at Vassar in a large number of test scores, Sanford has de­scribed the changes as follows: "Seniors have more culti­vated tastes, broader interests, greater attachment to the things of the mind. They are less authoritarian, less con­ventional and conforming, less fundamentalist in re­ligious outlook; they show more awareness and appre­ciation of the diversity of viewpoints a~opted by others, and are more liberal in their views on interpersonal re­lationships. . . . They are well ahead of freshmen in flexibility of thinking, capacity to suspend judgment, tolerance of ambiguity, skepticism, criticalness, realism. .. They are more assertive, rebellious, adventurous;

less passive, less modest, less submissive; they have greater breadth of consciousness, more self-insight, more famili­arity with their inner life." 6 Another empirical approach is to ask students and alumni what significant influences they recognize from their college experience. Still an­other would be to identify ideal stu,dents, as judged by faculty and peers, and through studying them to dis­cover the attributes valued in that college.

A third approach to the choice of variables for study is based on general theories of personality development. Significant aspects or stages of the process of growing and maturing would be selected for study. For example, independence from home and parents increases in late adolescence, and one can ask how college affects this development.

No general agreement on a list of concepts and meas­ures was attempted, and indeed such a list would be im­possible at the present stage of work in the field. It was recognized that much more needs to be done in all ap­proaches to the selection of variables, but the following general areas of interest, based in large part on Sanford's interviews of alumnae, were accepted as deserving study:

1. Disposition to use problem-solving, fact-finding, in­tellectual methods in coping with problems and crises, as contrasted with methods such as denial or faith.

2. Broad perspective, tolerance, liberalism, independ­ence of judgment, flexibility (vs. the "authoritarian com­plex").

6 Nevitt Sanford, "The Impact of a Woman's College on Its Students," paper read at the 22nd Education Conference under the auspices of the Educational Records Bureau and the American Council on Education, New York, November I, 1957, pp. 4-5.

3. The growth of autonomous interests with increas­ing depth.

4. Mature personal relations, with independence from parents.

5. Freedom of impulse expression, readiness to tryout adventurous ideas and activities.

6. Establishment of sense of identity, integrated self­concept.

7. Social and civic responsibility, with active partici­pation in such activities.

8. Relative values as evidenced in measures such as the Allport-Vernon Scale.

This list is not meant to be comprehensive or inclu­sive, and does not refer to mental health, masculinity­femininity, specific beliefs, attitudes, and other charac­teristics which have been the subject of study.

Turning to a consideration of methods available for the measurement of variables such as those listed above, the conference produced a wealth of stimulating sugges­tions and the expected amount of disagreement on gen­eral approach. Some members strongly defended the clinical study of individuals, with intensive depth inter­views and projective tests in order to gain a full under­standing of the total person. Others emphasized the ob­jectivity and comparability gained by the use of stand­ardized tests, the interpretation of which is guided by the many researches contributing to their validation. There was agreement that both kinds of assessment should be employed when feasible, with intensive study of a subsample of individuals selected to represent critical types disclosed by the test scores.

COMMITTEE BRIEFS

ANALYSIS OF ECONOMIC CENSUS DATA

John Perry Miller (chairman), Francis M. Boddy, Robert W. Burgess, Howard C. Grieves, Frank A. Hanna, George J. Stigler, Ralph J. Watkins, J. Fred Weston.

The committee has made arrangements for a fourth study in its program, which is carried on in cooperation with the Bureau of the Census, to stimulate research based on data collected in the recent economic censuses. Ralph L. Nelson, Assistant Professor of Economics at Northwestern Univer­sity, has undertaken an analysis of the significance of cur­rent data on concentration and mergers of firms in selected manufacturing industries.

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COMPARATIVE POLITICS

Gabriel A. Almond (chairman), Taylor Cole, James S. Coleman, Roy C. Macridis, Sigmund Neumann, Guy J. Pauker, Lucian W. Pye, Walter R. Sharp; staff, Bryce Wood.

In addition to the 5 grants for field studies of political groups in foreign areas, reported in Items, March 1958, page 9, an award has been made jointly by the Committee on Comparative Politics and the Committee on the Near and Middle East, to Leonard Binder, Instructor in Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles, for research in Iran on the political role of the Ulama in Pakistan. The two committees also co-sponsored a third research planning

seminar in the series organized by the Committee on Com­parative Politics for recipients of its grants for field studies. This seminar was for the recipients of grants for research in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, under the programs of both committees, and was held at Endicott House, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, on May 4-6, 1958. As in the earlier seminars, the purpose was to develop plans for collaborative research among the grantees and to invite their cooperation in the collection of certain basic data in the form of inventories of political groups in the areas where research would be carried out. The participants included the following grantees who expect to undertake field research during 1958-59: Leonard Binder, recipient of the joint grant; Ralph Braibanti of Duke University, Carl H. Lande of Harvard University, Gordon K. Lewis of the University of Puerto Rico, and Stanley Spector of Washington Univer­sity, recipients of grants from the Committee on Compara­tive Politics; Panayiotis J. Vatikiotis of Indiana University, grantee of the Committee on the Near and Middle East. Lucian W. Pye and Dankwart A. Rustow, who has served as assistant to the chairman of the Committee on the Near and Middle East, were co-chairmen of the seminar. The other participants were Manfred Halpern, Department of State; George Lenczowski, University of California, Berkeley; Myron Weiner, University of Chicago; and Bryce Wood, staff for the Committee on Comparative Politics.

A report on the first seminar in this series, "A Compara­tive Study of Interest Groups and the Political Process" by Gabriel A. Almond, was published in the American Politi­cal Science Review, March 1958. G. A. A.

ECONOMIC GROWTH

Simon Kuznets (chairman), Richard Hartshorne, Melville J. Herskovits, Edgar M. Hoover, Bert F. Hoselitz, Wilbert E. Moore, Joseph J. Spengler.

The European studies in the committee's program of ap­praisals of long-term records relating to national income, wealth, and their components, in selected foreign countries, have resulted in several additional publications during the past year: "Trends in Eighteenth-Century Smuggling" by W. A. Cole of the Department of Applied Economics at the University of Cambridge, who is Phyllis Deane's collaborator in the studies on the United Kingdom, was published in the Economic History Review, April 1958. The detailed volume on national income estimates for Italy back to 1861, by Benedetto Barberi of the Central Institute of Statistics, Rome, has been published in the Institute's Annali di Sta­tistica, Series 8, Vol. 9 (1957). A separate 45-page summary in English, The Growth of National Income in Italy, 1861-1956, has also been published by the Institute. An analysis of some of the preliminary results of the study at the Central Statistical Bureau of Norway, by Odd Aukrust, Director of its Research Division, has been published as

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"Investeringenes Effekt pA Nasjonalproduktet," Statistisk Sentralbyra Artikler No. I (1957).

The third paper by the chairman of the committee in the series entitled "Quantitative Aspects of the Economic Growth of Nations" was published as a supplement to the July 1958 issue of Economic Development and Cultural Change, under the title "Industrial Disu'ibution of Income and Labor Force by States, United States, 1919-1921 to 1955."

FAMILY AND ECONOMIC BEHAVIOR

Dale Yoder (chairman), Gary S. Becker, Orville G. Brim, Jr., Philip M. Hauser, John B. Lansing, Gladys L. Palmer, James Tobin.

The committee, whose purpose is the stimulation of re­search on the family as a significant unit of economic be­havior, has cooperated with Consumer Behavior, Inc. in planning a major conference on Models of Household Decision-Making. The conference is to be held at the Uni­versity of Michigan on September 4-6, 1958. Sessions are scheduled on decision making on the following subjects: changes in family composition; saving and borrowing; allocation and spending; buying, including brand choices; husband-wife roles and careers. In planning this program an effort was made to draw equally on current research re­lating to the family in economics and in sociology.

LINGUISTICS AND PSYCHOLOGY

James J. Jenkins (chairman), John B. Carroll, Joseph H. Greenberg, Alvin M. Liberman, Floyd G. Lounsbury, Charles E. Osgood, Thomas A. Sebeok, Rulon S. Wells; staff, Joseph B. Casagrande.

Preliminary results of the committee's Southwest Project in Comparative Psycholinguistics, for which the major field research was completed in the summer of 1956, were critically reviewed at a conference of the project staff held at the University of Illinois last fall. Further analysis of the field data, including extensive factor analysis, and the collection of additional data on English-speaking and other control groups have continued during the year. These find­ings are being incorporated in the over-all report on the project, which is in preparation under the editorship of its director, John B. Carroll. Meanwhile separate reports on the numerous component studies continue to be published as articles and monographs. An article reporting some of the results of the research conducted among the Hopi and Navaho Indians, "The Function of Language Classifications in Behavior," by John B. Carroll and Joseph B. Casagrande,

has been published in Readings in Social Psychology, edited by Eleanor Maccoby, Theodore M. Newcomb, and Eugene L. Hartley (3rd ed.; New York: Henry Holt and Co., 1958). Zuni Dictionary by Stanley Newman, Publication 6 of the Indiana University Research Center in Anthropology, Folk­lore, and Linguistics (January 1958) is based in part on the research of the Southwest Project's Zuni team.

MATHEMATICS IN SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH

William G. Madow (chairman), Carl F. Christ, Sanford M. Dornbusch, John G. Kemeny, James G. March, Philip J. McCarthy, George A. Miller, Anatol Rapoport· staff, Elbridge Sibley. ' ,

The committee, appointed in January to succeed the former Committee on Mathematical Training of Social Scientists, held its first meeting on May 24. Under broadened terms of reference, it is concerned with both training and the advancement of research in statistics as well as in mathe­matics applicable to the social sciences.

Sharing its predecessor's view that effective demand for mathematical curricula suitable for social science students will arise only when actual use is made of mathematics in social science courses, the committee is giving attention to possible ways of stimulating the introduction of courses or sections of courses in which this will be done. Several mem­bers of the committee are actively exploring possibilities in their respective social science fields.

A second immediate concern is the planning of a sequence of courses in statistics for social science students, based on certain prerequisite training in mathematics. The first and second year mathematics courses proposed by the Com­mittee on the Undergraduate Program of the Mathematical Association of America are assumed as points of departure; the latter are essentially in accord with the "Recommended Policies for the Mathematical Training of Social Scientists" issued by the Council's former committee (Items, June 1955).

Other matters on the committee's tentative agenda for the coming year include problems in the application of elec­tronic computers, personnel problems, and problems of stimulation and financial support for mathematical research in various social science fie1ds.

Continuing attention is being given to plans for publi­cation, in various journals or otherwise, of materials pre­sented at the 1957 summer institutes on applications of mathematics for social scientists and for college teachers of mathematics. The v01ume by Samuel Goldberg, Introduc­tion to Difference Equations: With Illustrative Examples from Economics, Psychology, and Sociology, preparation of which was aided by the former Committee on Mathe­matical Training of Social Scientists, was published by John Wiley & Sons in May.

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PREVENTIVE MEDICINE AND SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH

Hugh R. Leavell (chairman), Benjamin D. Paul (secre­tary), Leona Baumgartner, Harold F. Dorn, H. van Zile Hyde, Stanley H. King, Lyle Saunders, Leo W. Simmons, John M. Weir, Donald Young.

The committee held a major conference on preventive medicine and social science research, financed by a grant to the Council from the Rockefeller Foundation, at Skytop, Pa. on June 22-27. The participants included 13 physicians active in the field of public health; 6 public hea1th special­ists representing the fields of biostatistics, dentistry, engi­neering, nursing, and health education; 10 sociologists, 6 psychologists, and 3 anthropologists. They met in morning and evening sessions to consider research areas of joint in­terest and to discuss ways of facilitating interdisciplinary collaboration. Stanley H. King bore the main responsi­bility for arranging the details of the conference.

The theme of the conference was set by the question: Why do people accept or not accept public health programs? Some programs were seen as calling for single decisions and others for continuous decisions, either by individuals or by groups. Each of four logical types of decision was exempli­fied at the conference by one or more research reports, most of which were distributed to participants in advance.

The morning session of the first day, chaired by John M. Weir, was devoted to single decisions by individuals and considered three reports: "Public Attitudes and Actions toward Polio Vaccine," by John A. Clausen of the National Institute of Mental Health; "Public Participation in Mass X-Ray Screening Programs," by Andie L. Knutson of the School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley; and "Data on Acceptance or Rejection of a Request for a Clinical Examination in a Field Survey of Rheumatoid Arthritis," by Stanley H. King. Under the chairmanship of Lyle Saunders the topic for the second day, single decisions by communities, was illustrated by a paper on "Fluorida­tion of Community Water Supplies," by Benjamin D. Paul. On the third day Leo W. Simmons chaired a session on con­tinuing decisions by individuals, for which George M. Foster of the University of California, Berkeley, had pre­pared a summary paper on "Sickness and Health in Sal Si Puedes: Mexican-Americans in a California Community"; Robert Straus of the University of Kentucky Medical Center, a paper on "Alcoholism as a Public Health Problem Involv­ing Continuous Decisions by Individuals"; and Leo W. Sim­mons, a paper on "Family Culture and Participation in a Rheumatic Fever Clinic." The fourth day's session, under the chairmanship of H. van Zile Hyde, was on continuing decisions by groups. For this session George Rosen of the School of Public Health and Administrative Medicine, Columbia University, had prepared a paper on "Some As­pects of the Sociology of Medicine with Particular Reference to Prepaid Group Practice"; and John J. Adair, anthropolo­gist, of Sandoval, New Mexico, and Walsh McDermott of the Cornell University Medical College presented ma-

terial on "The Process of Innovation and the N avaho­Cornell Field Health Research Project."

The evening session on each day was given over to gen­eral discussion of the relationship between social science and public health. Hugh R. Leavell was general chairman at the final session of the conference; Edward S. Rogers of the School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley, and Donald Young summarized the results of the deliberations. Robert N. Wilson of Harvard University, who attended the conference as rapporteur, is preparing an ac­count of the proceedings for consideration by the committee at a meeting early in the fall.

During the spring, revisions of five of the memoranda pre­pared for the committee in earlier years were published: three in the Council's pamphlet series, as listed on page 34 infra; and two, "Ecologic Determinants of Population Growth," by Carl E. Taylor, John B. Wyon, and John E. Gordon, and "Some Directions for Research on Fertility Control," by J. Mayone Stycos, in the Milbank Memorial Fund Quarte1'[Y, April 1958.

SLAVIC STUDIES

(Joint with American Council of Learned Societies)

William B. Edgerton (chairman), Robert F. Byrnes (sec­retary), Abram Bergson, C. E. Black, Merle Fainsod, Chauncy D. Harris, Charles J elavich, Henry L. Roberts,

PERSONNEL

COUNCIL STAFF Lloyd Morrisett, Jr. will join the staff of the Council on

September 2. A graduate of Oberlin College, Mr. Morrisett received the Ph.D. degree in psychology from Yale Uni­versity in 1956, and for the past two years has been an instructor in the School of Education at the University of California, Berkeley.

33

Marshall p . Shulman, Ernest J. Simmons, S. Harrison Thom­son, Sergius Yakobson.

In addition to the grants for Slavic and East European Studies reported in Items, June 1958, pages 22-23, an award has been made by the Subcommittee on Grants to David T . Cattell, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles, for research on the attitude and practice of the Soviet Union in respect to international law. Robert V. Daniels, Faculty of Social Science, Bennington College, who declined a grant for research on social and in­tellectual policies in Soviet Russia, 1929-37, has been awarded a grant-in-aid for research on Soviet party and government documents in the Trotsky Archive, Harvard University. Louis Nemzer, Associate Professor of Political Science, Ohio State University, originally named an alter­nate by the subcommittee, has received a grant for research on the ideology and functions of the Communist Party in Soviet society and the Soviet armed forces.

Under the program announced in Items, March 1958, page 12, the subcommittee has awarded the following travel grants for attendance at an international conference on "the Soviet Union and Asia," to be held at Bad Aussee, Austria, on September 22-27, 1958, under the sponsorship of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Ost, of Vienna: Oleg Hoeffding, Eco­nomics Division, RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, Cali­fornia; Alex Inkeles, Professor of Sociology, Russian Re­search Center, Harvard University; Paul F. Langer, Assistant Professor of International Relations and History, Univer­sity of Southern California; and Donald W. Treadgold, Associate Professor of History, University of Washington.

NEW COUNCIL OFFICES

On July 17 the offices of the Council were moved to Room 2301 on the 23rd floor of the same building where they have been located since 1929. The new quarters accommodate not only the staff members previously on the 27th floor but also those who had been temporarily housed on the sixth floor during the past year, following the closing of the Washington office.

PUBLICA lIONS

COUNCIL MONOGRAPHS

Migration and Mental Disease: A Study of First Admis­sions to Hospitals for Mental Disease, New York,1939-1941, by Benjamin Malzberg and Everett S. Lee, with an introduction by Dorothy S. Thomas. Sponsored by the Committee on Migration Differentials. March 1956. 152 pages. $1.50.

Labor Mobility in Six Cities, prepared by Gladys L. Palmer, with the assistance of Carol P. Brainerd, for the former Committee on Labor Market Research. June 1954. 191 pages. Paper, $2.25; cloth, $2.75.

Social Behavior and Personality: Contributions of W. 1. Thomas to Theory and Social Research, edited by Edmund H. Volkart. June 1951. 348 pages. Cloth, $3.00.

Support for Independent Scholarship and Research, by Elbridge Sibley. Report of an inquiry jointly spon­sored by the American Philosophical Society and the Social Science Research Council. May 1951. 131 pages. $1.25.

COUNCIL BULLETINS

Research on Labor Mobility: An Appraisal of Research Findings in the United States, Bulletin 65, by Herbert S. Parnes. October 1954. 216 pages. $1.75.

The Social Sciences in Historical Study: A Report of the Committee on Historiography, Bulletin 64. July 1954. 191 pages. Paper, $1.75; cloth, $2.25.

Adjustment to Physical Handicap and Illness: A Survey of the Social Psychology of Physique and Disability, Bulletin 55, revised edition, by Roger G. Barker, in collaboration with Beatrice A. Wright, Lee Meyerson, Mollie R. Gonick. April 1953. 456 pages. $2.00.

COUNCIL PAMPHLETS: MEMORANDA TO THE COMMITTEE ON PREVENTIVE MEDICINE

AND SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH

Effects of Social and Cultural Systems in Reactions to St1'ess, Pamphlet 14, by William Caudill. June 1958. 39 pages. 50 cents.

Social Status and Public Health, Pamphlet 13, by Ozzie G. Simmons. May 1958. 39 pages. 50 cents.

Pmblems in Intercultural Health Programs, Pamphlet 12, by George M. Foster. April 1958. 54 pages. 50 cents.

Special price for the three pamphlets together, $1.00.

OTHER COUNCIL PAMPHLETS AND REPORTS

Expectations, Uncertainty, and Business Behavior: A Conference Held at Carnegie Institute of Technology, October 27-29, 1955, under the Auspices of the Com­mittee on Business Enterprise Research, edited by Mary Jean Bowman. May 1958. 209 pages. Lithoprinted. $2.00.

The Business Enterprise as a Subject for Research, Pamphlet II, by Howard R. Bowen. Sponsored by the Committee on Business Enterprise Research. May 1955. III pages. $1.25.

Bibliographies on Personality and Social Development of the Child, Pamphlet 10, compiled by Christoph Heinicke and Beatrice B. Whiting. June 1953. 138 pages. $1.00.

Exchange of Persons: The Evolution of Cross-Cultural Education, Pamphlet 9, by Guy S. Metraux. June 1952. 58 pages. 50 cents.

The Council's monographs, bulletins, pamphlets, and lithoprinted reports are distributed from the office of the Council, 230 Park Avenue, New York 17, N. Y.

CENSUS MONOGRAPHS

These volumes, sponsored by the former Committee on Census Monographs in cooperation with the Bureau of the Census, are published by John Wiley & Sons, New York:

34

The American Labor Fm'ce, by Gertrude Bancroft. August 1958. About 228 pages. Cloth, $6.50.

The Fertility of American Women, by Wilson H. Grabill, Clyde V. Kiser, and P. K. Whelpton. August 1958. About 464 pages. Cloth, $9.50.

The Older Population of the United States, by Henry D. Sheldon. July 1958. 236 pages. Cloth, $6.00.

Ame1'ica's Children, by Eleanor H. Bernert. February 1958. 199 pages. Cloth, $6.00.

The Changing population of the United States, by Con­rad Taeuber and Irene B. Taeuber. January 1958. 368 pages. Cloth, $7.75.

Farm Housing, by Glenn H. Beyer and J. Hugh Rose. November 1957. 205 pages. Cloth, $6.00.

Residential Finance, 1950, by Richard U. Ratcliff, Daniel B. Rathbun, and Junia H. Honnold. October 1957. 190 pages. Cloth, $6.00.

American Housing and Its Use: The Demand for Shelter Space, by Louis Winnick, with the assistance of Ned Shilling. March 1957. 157 pages. Cloth, $5.50.

American Families, by Paul C. Glick. February 1957. 254 pages. Cloth, $6.00.

Social Characteristics of Urban and Rural Communities, 1950, by Otis Dudley Duncan and Albert J. Reiss, Jr. October 1956. 439 pages. Cloth, $7.50.

Immigrants and Their Children, 1850-1950, by E. P. Hutchinson. August 1956. 405 pages. Cloth, $7.50.

Income of the American People, by Herman P. Miller. October 1955. 222 pages. CIOtll, $6.50.

American Agriculture: Its Structure and Place in the Economy, by Ronald L. Mighell. April 1955. 199 pages. Cloth, $6.50.

CROSS-CULTURAL EDUCATION MONOGRAPHS

These monographs are sponsored by the Committee on Cross-Cultural Education and are published by the Uni­versity of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis:

In Search of Identity: The Japanese Overseas Scholar in Ame1'ica and Japan, by John ,,y. Bennett, Herbert

Passin, and Robert K. McKnight. October 1958. About 420 pages. Cloth, $7.50.

No Frontier to Learning: The Mexican Student in the United States, by Ralph L. Beals and Norman D. Humphrey. August 1957. 159 pages. Cloth, $3.25.

Indian Students on an American Campus, by Richard D. Lambert and Marvin Bressler. December 1956. 133 pages. Cloth, $3.00.

The American Experience of Swedish Students, by Franklin D. Scott. June 1956. 142 pages. Cloth, $3.00.

OTHER BOOKS

Explorations in Social Psychiatry, edited by Alexander H. Leighton, John A. Clausen, and Robert N. Wilson. New York: Basic Books, December 1957. 462 pages. Cloth, $6.75.

Sampling Opinions: An Analysis of Survey Procedures, by Frederick F. Stephan and Philip J. McCarthy. Re­port on studies initiated under the auspices of the former joint Committee on Measurement of Opinion, Attitudes, and Consumer Wants, appointed by the National Research Council and the Social Science Re­search Council. New York: John Wiley & Sons, June 1958. 472 pages. Cloth, $12.00.

Talent and Society: New Perspectives in the Identification of Talent, by David C. McClelland, Alfred L. Baldwin, Urie Bronfenbrenner, and Fred L. Strodtbeck. Report of the former Committee on Identification of Talent. Princeton, N. J.: D. Van Nostrand Company, June 1958. 282 pages. Cloth, $3.75.

Theory and Methods of Scaling, by Warren S. Torgerson. Prepared for the former Committee on Scaling Theory and Methods. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Septem­ber 1958. About 490 pages. Cloth, $9.50.

SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH COUNCIL FELLOWSHIPS AND GRANTS TO BE OFFERED IN 1958-59

A brochure describing the Council's programs of fel­lowships and grants for the coming year will be dis­tributed as usual about October 1, and will be mailed to individuals on request addressed to the Social Science Research Council Fellowships and Grants, 230 Park Avenue, New York 17, N. Y. Especial attention is called to the several dosing dates for receipt of applica­tions or nominations under different programs:

Research Training Fellowships, January 7, 1959

Fellowships for Completion of Doctoral Dissertations, January 7

Fellowships in Political Theory and Legal Philosophy, January 7

Faculty Research Fellowships, January 7 Grants-in-Aid of Research, and Faculty Research

Grants: November 1, 1958 and February 1, 1959 (awards to be announced Janaury 2 and April 1, respectively)

Auxiliary Research Awards, October 15, 1958 (see Items, June 1958, page 24)

Senior Research Awards in American Governmental Affairs, November 1, 1958 (awards to be announced in January)

Grants for Research on American Governmental Processes, November 1 (awal-ds to be announced January 2)

Grants for Research on the Near and Middle East, November 1 (awards to be annonnced January 2)

Grants for Slavic and East European Studies, Novem­ber 1 (awards to be announced January 2)

35

International Conference Travel Grants, December 1 (awards to be announced February 2) for the fol­lowing meetings in 1959:

Institut International de Finances Publiques, Europe, summer 1959

Inter-American Society of Psychology congress, Rio de Janeiro, August 1959

International Congress of the History of Science, Barcelona, August- September, 1959

International Economic Association round table (tentative)

International Institute of Administrative Sciences, Europe, summer 1959

International Political Science Association round table (tentative)

International Sociological Association congress, Perugia, September 8-15, 1959

International Statistical Institute (tentative) International Union for the Scientific Study of

Population, Vienna, August 28 - September 4, 1959

Because the requirements, procedures, and forms differ for the various programs, inquiries should indi­cate briefly the candidate's age, academic degrees held or sought, country of permanent residence, present posi­tion or activity, and the nature of the training, research, or travel for which support is desired.

Except as noted above, awards will be annonnced on or before April 1, 1959.

ANNOUNCEMENT

INTERNATIONAL CONGRESSES IN THE HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES

TO BE HELD IN THE UNITED STATES

A grant of $500,000 by the Ford Foundation to be used toward the expenses of holding international scholarly congresses in this country, over a period of at least five years, will be administered by a joint committee of the American Council of Learned Societies and the Social Science Research Council, consisting of Frederick Burkhardt, Charles Frankel, John Gardner, Pendleton Herring, and Donald Young. Under the terms of the grant, organizations sponsoring international congresses are expected to secure maximum assistance from other sources so that the program may aid as many scholarly associations as possible, over as long a period as possible.

Applications are invited from scholarly humanistic and social science organizations in the United States for

the support of congresses in their respective fields. Any congress devoted to the advancement of fundamental research in the humanities or the social sciences, and involving multinational scholarly representation, is eligible for support.

Sponsoring organizations should submit in their ap­plications as much information as possible concerning the size and the program of the proposed congress, in­cluding a tentative budget, and an estimate of the sup­port that is expected to be obtained from other sources.

Funds granted by the joint committee are to be ap­plied ' to the following expenses: (a) travel grants and per diem to foreign scholars who are to be active par­ticipants in the congress; (b) administrative expenses of the organizing committees.

Inquiries and applications should be addressed to the administrative officer of the program: Robert Hoopes, Vice President, American Council of Learned Societies, 345 East 46 Street, New York 17, N. Y.

SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH COUNCIL

250 PARK AVENUE. NEW YORK 17. N. Y.

Incorporated in the State of Illinois, December 27, 1921, for the purpose of advancing research in the social sciences

Directors, 1958: GABRIEL A. ALMOND. TAYLOR COLE. HAROLD F. DORN, FRED EGGAN. ROBERT E. L. FAllIS, R. A. GORDON, LOUIS GOTTSCHALK,

PENDLETON HmuuNG, E. ADAMSON HOEBEL, WAYNE H. HOLTZMAN, LYLE H. LANIER, EARL LATHAM, PHILIP J. McCARTHY, DOUGLAS MCGREGOR,

JOHN PERRY MILLER, FREDERICK MOSTELLER, FRANK C . NEWMAN, WILLIAM H. NICHOLLS, DAVID M. POTTER, CARROLL L. SHARTLE, RICHARD H. SHRYOCK,

HERBERT A. SIMON, CONRAD TAEUBER., SCHUYLER C. WALLACE, RALPH J. WATKINS, GORDON R. WILLEY, MALCOLM M. WILLEY, ROBIN M. WIL'

LIAMS, JR., C. VANN WOODWARD, DONALD YOUNG

Officers and Staff: PENDLETON HERRING, President,' PAUL WEBBINK, Fiee·President; ELBRIDGE SIBLEY, Executive Associate; DONALD G. MAR.

QUIS; BRYCE WOOD; ELEANOR C. ISBELL; JOSEPH B. CASAGRANDE; LLOYD MORRISETT, JR.; CATHERINE V. RONNAN, Financial Secretary

36