In this Items archive piece from 1964, Sidney Verba reports on a conference organized by the SSRC’s Committee on Comparative Politics that addressed how survey research methods can help understand political change in the developing world—what was then referred to as “political modernization.” The conference considered the use of survey research in comparative studies, how to expand survey research by focusing on subgroups within nation states, and potential methodological and organizational problems.
From Our Archives
Simulation of Cognitive Processes: A Report on the Summer Research Training Institute, 1958
by Items EditorsIn an effort to better understand the application of digital computers in the social sciences, particularly psychology, the SSRC’s Committee on the Simulation of Cognitive Processes, working alongside the RAND Corporation, convened a summer training institute to gauge this new technology’s application by a select group of social scientists. Written by the institute’s codirectors, Herbert A. Simon and Allen Newell, this 1958 archive report details the activities, particularly the programming of cognitive simulations, of the three-week event, and concludes with steps to further disseminate simulation techniques and expand the field.
The Sexuality Research Fellowship Program: Ten Years After
by Items EditorsTen years ago Diane di Mauro, director of the Sexuality Research Fellowship Program (SRFP) (1995–2006), reflected on the SSRC’s effort to develop the field of gender and sexuality studies beyond the public health sphere. For Pride Month, Items republishes di Mauro’s retrospective to offer readers a window through which to reflect on the development and history of this field over the years. The SSRC will also be revisiting the SRFP in the fall of 2018 with a digital media project highlighting contributions from former fellows.
The History of American Military Policy: A New Program of Grants for Research
by Items EditorsThe end of World War II and the start of the Cold War placed the United States in a new geopolitical and military position in the world. To better understand the policy implications of this new role’s effect on the public, the SSRC convened the Committee on Civil-Military Relations Research in 1952. Here, Gordon A. Craig and Bryce Wood describe the committee’s findings as of 1954, emphasizing the lack of history on US military policy and introducing a new grants program to expand historical and social science research on the topic.
Mass Communications and the 1976 Presidential Election
by Items EditorsIn light of the SSRC’s Media & Democracy program’s ongoing work, Items revisits this 1975 piece by Thomas E. Patterson and Ronald P. Abeles. As part of the Council’s Committee on Mass Communication and Political Behavior, the authors present the impetus behind this committee’s formation as well as potential research directions to explore, including how the media agenda is set, what and who influences it, and how the media impacts public opinion throughout an election cycle. Readers might want to compare their understanding of the present moment to how scholars imagined the fraught, complex relationship between media and politics over 40 years ago when, as the authors argue, already “mass media” has “supplanted political parties as the major intermediary between office seekers and the electorate.”
Negotiating a Passage Between Disciplinary Borders: A Symposium
by Items EditorsOriginally published in the Chronicle of Higher Education and republished in Items & Issues in 2000 to kick off a symposium, Ken Wissoker’s piece examines the definition of interdisciplinarity and interdisciplinary research at the turn of the twenty-first century. He finds interdisciplinary research to be a balance between disciplines, one which is under tension from myriad forces, but in particular a territorial impulse, whether conscious or unconscious, to claim the primacy of one’s discipline. To work at the borders of disciplines, Wissoker concludes, scholars must be willing to face their own disciplinary biases.
Response by Thomas Bender
by Items EditorsThomas Bender, in building on Wissoker’s essay, argues that interdisciplinarity “needs to be understood in the context of the social dynamics of academic culture.” Bender goes back to the SSRC’s early use of the concept as linked to addressing public problems, and an engagement with the world is still a vital reason for its practice today. At the same time, interdisciplinary work faces challenges in terms of both the criteria by which its quality can be judged and as a basis for training new generations.
Census 2000—Science Meets Politics
by Items EditorsWe continue republishing Items archival essays from a 1999 special issue on the 2000 census with this contribution on political partisanship’s new effects on enumeration. Kenneth Prewitt, then director of the US Census Bureau, warns in this piece against the politicization of methodology and sampling techniques as happened in the run-up to the 2000 census. Though the census has always been political, Prewitt argued that politicians’ shift from politicizing the results to the methodology potentially undermines science, the public’s trust in the census, and the quality of its findings, creating a ripple effect across all national statistics.
Understanding the American Soldier: The SSRC and Social Science in World War II
by Rodrigo UgarteA "big data" project for its day, the SSRC's The American Soldier series was deeply influential in shaping the social science of military organization and in developing new research methods. On the occasion of its four volumes and the underlying trove of data becoming openly accessible, Items republishes several archival essays on The American Soldier. Here, Rodrigo Ugarte provides an overview of the project's origins and impact.
Experiments on Mass Communication
by Items EditorsIn this piece from the Items archive, Carl I. Hovland, Arthur A. Lumsdaine, and Fred D. Sheffield encapsulate the work of volume III of The American Soldier series, Experiments on Mass Communication, which analyzed efforts at indoctrination and instruction conducted on soldiers during World War II. In particular, they highlight the controlled experiment comparisons on responses to the US Army’s “Why We Fight” film series, as well as the limitations of conducting research on the effectiveness of various media of communication.