Main trends of research in the social and human ... - unesdoc - Unesco

Sociology 71
wise. Similarly, in their attitudes to the essential gratifications of a job, the
students were classifled as person-directed (wishing to help people, to derive
self-satisfaction, to express their own abilities, etc.) or again, not person-directed
(wishing to become rich, successful, economically secure, etc.). (The figures in
Rosenberg’s study have been modified slightly to make the argument as clear
as possible.)
We concentrate first on the marginal figures of the table given in the ‘total’ row
and column. We find the first result: the students ‘harmonize’ their choices
and their attitudes; the number of cases which show dissonance betweeen choice
and values is smaller at the end of the college period (1952) than it was in the
middle of it (1950).
We then concentrate on the inner figures in the second and third rows of the
table. These are the people whose pattern was originally dissonant. A number of
these respondents have moved into the first or the last column; their choices and
their values have become consonant. But where have they moved? W e encircle
the shifts which are relatively more frequent. It happens more often that occupa-
tional choices remain constant and that verbalized values adjust to them rather
than values leading to shifts in choices.
Obviously, such a structure does not depend on two variates only. A completed
model would add elements. The first and last row of the table give a hint as to
incompleteness of the scheme. These are the people for whom choices and values
are at first consonant. Yet some of them do not maintain this harmony - they are
indicated by the figures with triangles. Again we single out two figures, this time
by triangle, and we obtain additional information. Zf harmony is disrupted,
values are likely to be less stable than choices. The four specially marked figures
indicate the extent to which the two items, choice and values, fail to account
for the whole process. (Incidentally, some of these moves may be partially
attributed to unreliability of measurement.)
This is not the place to go into the abundant details contained in such rela-
tively simple tables. The main point to be made is that repeated surveys with
the same subjects permit a very precise analysis of the notion of process. Many
such studies already exist: the interaction between party affiliation and position
on specific political issues; the use of commercial products and the customer’s
exposure to advertising; the military attitude of soldiers and their chances of
being promoted, etc. It is not the substantive content of such studies which
matters at this point. It is the procedure itself which helps to clarify many a
murky discussion around the problem of causal relations. This is true not only
for the analysis of processes. It applies also to other topics that are controversial
in general sociology. One more example, taken from the core of general socio-
logical discussion, wil clarify this general trend.
Social corntexts
In spite of its ultimate contributions, the survey movement had, for a while,
deleterious effects on the development of general sociology. This is best exem-
plified by what happened to the once dominant tradition of community studies.
German sociologists like Von Wiese sent their students to rural villages so that