Showing papers in "American Sociological Review in 2015"
TL;DR: By studying prizewinners in biomedicine and chemistry, it is shown that occasional gambles for extraordinary impact are a compelling explanation for observed levels of risky innovation.
Abstract: What factors affect a scientist’s choice of research problem? Qualitative research in the history and sociology of science suggests that this choice is patterned by an “essential tension” between productive tradition and risky innovation. We examine this tension through Bourdieu’s field theory of science, and we explore it empirically by analyzing millions of biomedical abstracts from MEDLINE. We represent the evolving state of chemical knowledge with networks extracted from these abstracts. We then develop a typology of research strategies on these networks. Scientists can introduce novel chemicals and chemical relationships (innovation) or delve deeper into known ones (tradition). They can consolidate knowledge clusters or bridge them. The aggregate distribution of published strategies remains remarkably stable. High-risk innovation strategies are rare and reflect a growing focus on established knowledge. An innovative publication is more likely to achieve high impact than a conservative one, but the ad...
361 citations
TL;DR: Examining the extent to which institutional constraints, including workplace policies, affect young, unmarried men's and women’s preferences for their future work-family arrangements sheds light on important questions about the role of institutions in shaping work- family preferences, underscoring the notion that seemingly gender-traditional work- Family decisions are largely contingent on the constraints of current workplaces.
Abstract: Why has progress toward gender equality in the workplace and at home stalled in recent decades? A growing body of scholarship suggests that persistently gendered workplace norms and policies limit men's and women's ability to create gender egalitarian relationships at home. In this article, we build on and extend prior research by examining the extent to which institutional constraints, including workplace policies, affect young, unmarried men's and women's preferences for their future work-family arrangements. We also examine how these effects vary across levels of education. Drawing on original survey-experimental data, we ask respondents how they would like to structure their future relationships while experimentally manipulating the degree of institutional constraint under which they state their preferences. Two clear patterns emerge. First, as constraints are removed and men and women can opt for an egalitarian relationship, the majority of them choose this option, regardless of gender or education level. Second, women's relationship structure preferences are more malleable to the removal of institutional constraints via supportive work-family policy interventions than are men's. These findings shed light on important questions about the role of institutions in shaping work-family preferences, underscoring the notion that seemingly gender-traditional work-family decisions are largely contingent on the constraints of current workplaces.
314 citations
TL;DR: The authors found that middle-class young adults had more knowledge than their working-class or poor counterparts of the "rules of the game" regarding how institutions worked and displayed more of a sense of entitlement to ask for help.
Abstract: Using both qualitative longitudinal data collected 20 years after the original Unequal Childhoods study and interview data from a study of upwardly mobile adults, this address demonstrates how cultural knowledge matters when white and African American young adults of differing class backgrounds navigate key institutions. I find that middle-class young adults had more knowledge than their working-class or poor counterparts of the “rules of the game” regarding how institutions worked. They also displayed more of a sense of entitlement to ask for help. When faced with a problem related to an institution, middle-class young adults frequently succeeded in getting their needs accommodated by the institution; working-class and poor young adults were less knowledgeable about and more frustrated by bureaucracies. This address also shows the crucial role of “cultural guides” who help upwardly mobile adults navigate institutions. While many studies of class reproduction have looked at key turning points, this address argues that “small moments” may be critical in setting the direction of life paths.
297 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors draw on sociological and psychological literatures to develop a theory of the varied effects of bureaucratic reforms on managerial motivation, and they contend that initiatives that engage managers in promoting diversity will increase diversity.
Abstract: Organization scholars since Max Weber have argued that formal personnel systems can prevent discrimination. We draw on sociological and psychological literatures to develop a theory of the varied effects of bureaucratic reforms on managerial motivation. Drawing on self-perception and cognitive-dissonance theories, we contend that initiatives that engage managers in promoting diversity—special recruitment and training programs—will increase diversity. Drawing on job-autonomy and self-determination theories, we contend that initiatives that limit managerial discretion in hiring and promotion—job tests, performance evaluations, and grievance procedures—will elicit resistance and produce adverse effects. Drawing on transparency and accountability theories, we contend that bureaucratic reforms that increase transparency for job-seekers and hiring managers—job postings and job ladders—will have positive effects. Finally, drawing on accountability theory, we contend that monitoring by diversity managers and fede...
207 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that residential exposure to ethnic diversity reduces social trust and that ethnic diversity can reduce trust in the general public, and that the relationship between contextual ethnic diversity and trust has been studied within-country analyses of the relationship.
Abstract: We argue that residential exposure to ethnic diversity reduces social trust. Previous within-country analyses of the relationship between contextual ethnic diversity and trust have been conducted a...
194 citations
TL;DR: The authors decompose metropolitan segregation into its within-and between-place components from 1990 to 2010, showing that the locus of racial differentiation resides increasingly in socio-spatial processes at the community or place level.
Abstract: This article documents a new macro-segregation, where the locus of racial differentiation resides increasingly in socio-spatial processes at the community or place level. The goal is to broaden the spatial lens for studying segregation, using decennial Census data on 222 metropolitan areas. Unlike previous neighborhood studies of racial change, we decompose metropolitan segregation into its within- and between-place components from 1990 to 2010. This is accomplished with the Theil index (H). Our decomposition of H reveals large post-1990 declines in metropolitan segregation. But, significantly, macro-segregation—the between-place component—has increased since 1990, offsetting declines in the within-place component. The macro component of segregation is also most pronounced and increasing most rapidly among blacks, accounting for roughly one-half of all metro segregation in the most segregated metropolitan areas of the United States. Macro-segregation is least evident among Asians, which suggests other mem...
188 citations
TL;DR: The results indicate that family instability has a causal effect on children’s development, but the effect depends on the type of change, the outcome assessed, and the population examined.
Abstract: A growing literature documents the importance of family instability for child wellbeing. In this article, we use longitudinal data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to examine the impacts of family instability on children's cognitive and socioemotional development in early and middle childhood. We extend existing research in several ways: (1) by distinguishing between the number and types of family structure changes; (2) by accounting for time-varying as well as time-constant confounding; and (3) by assessing racial/ethnic and gender differences in family instability effects. Our results indicate that family instability has a causal effect on children's development, but the effect depends on the type of change, the outcome assessed, and the population examined. Generally speaking, transitions out of a two-parent family are more negative for children's development than transitions into a two-parent family. The effect of family instability is stronger for children's socioemotional development than for their cognitive achievement. For socioemotional development, transitions out of a two-parent family are more negative for white children, whereas transitions into a two-parent family are more negative for Hispanic children. These findings suggest that future research should pay more attention to the type of family structure transition and to population heterogeneity.
178 citations
TL;DR: This paper investigated how activism against hydraulic fracturing (fracking) utilized cultural artifacts to influence public perceptions and effect change and found that Gasland contributed not only to greater online searching about fracking, but also to increased social media chatter and heightened mass media coverage.
Abstract: Recent scholarship highlights the importance of public discourse for the mobilization and impact of social movements, but it neglects how cultural products may shift discourse and thereby influence mobilization and political outcomes. This study investigates how activism against hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) utilized cultural artifacts to influence public perceptions and effect change. A systematic analysis of Internet search data, social media postings, and newspaper articles allows us to identify how the documentary Gasland reshaped public discourse. We find that Gasland contributed not only to greater online searching about fracking, but also to increased social media chatter and heightened mass media coverage. Local screenings of Gasland contributed to anti-fracking mobilizations, which, in turn, affected the passage of local fracking moratoria in the Marcellus Shale states. These results have implications not only for understanding movement outcomes, but also for theory and research on media, the...
175 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explore whether and how corporations become more receptive to social activist challenges over time, and suggest a dynamic process through which contentious interactions lead to increased receptivity, and test their theory using a unique longitudinal dataset that tracks contentious attacks and the adoption of social management devices among a population of 300 large firms.
Abstract: This project explores whether and how corporations become more receptive to social activist challenges over time. Drawing from social movement theory, we suggest a dynamic process through which contentious interactions lead to increased receptivity. We argue that when firms are chronically targeted by social activists, they respond defensively by adopting strategic management devices that help them better manage social issues and demonstrate their normative appropriateness. These defensive devices have the incidental effect of empowering independent monitors and increasing corporate accountability, which in turn increase a firm’s receptivity to future activist challenges. We test our theory using a unique longitudinal dataset that tracks contentious attacks and the adoption of social management devices among a population of 300 large firms from 1993 to 2009.
167 citations
TL;DR: This paper analyzed career survival models and interaction effects between gender and different measures of social capital and information openness and found that female actors have a higher risk of career failure than do their male colleagues when affiliated in cohesive networks, but women have better survival chances when embedded in open, diverse structures.
Abstract: That social capital matters is an established fact in the social sciences. Less clear, however, is how different forms of social capital affect gender disadvantages in career advancement. Focusing on a project-based type of labor market, namely the U.S. film industry, this study argues that women suffer a “closure penalty” and face severe career disadvantages when collaborating in cohesive teams. At the same time, gender disadvantages are reduced for women who build social capital in open networks with higher degrees of diversity and information flow. Using large-scale longitudinal data on career profiles of about one million performances by 97,657 film actors in 369,099 film productions between the years 1929 and 2010, I analyze career survival models and interaction effects between gender and different measures of social capital and information openness. Findings reveal that female actors have a higher risk of career failure than do their male colleagues when affiliated in cohesive networks, but women have better survival chances when embedded in open, diverse structures. This study contributes to the understanding of how and what type of social capital can be either a beneficial resource for otherwise disadvantaged groups or a constraining mechanism that intensifies gender differences in career advancement.
160 citations
TL;DR: The authors studied the impact of Hispanic population growth on black-white relations in the United States and found that intergroup relations operate within a two-group paradigm, furnishing few insights into multi-group relations.
Abstract: How will Hispanic population growth affect black-white relations in the United States? Research on intergroup relations operates within a two-group paradigm, furnishing few insights into multi-grou...
TL;DR: The authors argue that values are tied to many forms of behavior, across both contexts and cultures, and they operate in ways consistent with dual-process models, and illustrate the plausibility of these claims using data from the second wave of the European Social Survey, as well as real-time decision data from a large, online survey.
Abstract: Dual-process models of culture and action posit that fast, automatic cognitive processes largely drive human action, with conscious processes playing a much smaller role than was previously supposed. These models have done much to advance our understanding of behavior, but they focus on generic processes rather than specific cultural content. As useful as this has been, it tells us little about which forms of culture matter for action. Drawing on a cross-disciplinary set of theory and evidence, I argue that values are tied to many forms of behavior, across both contexts and cultures, and they operate in ways consistent with dual-process models. I illustrate the plausibility of these claims using data from the second wave of the European Social Survey, as well as real-time decision data from a large, online survey. I show that values predict self-reported behaviors in a variety of substantive domains and across 25 nations, and they operate using automatic cognitive processes. These findings suggest that va...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors build on group position theory and the subcategorization model of intergroup contact by illustrating how, in a small-town settler-colonial context, contact tends to reproduce, rather...
Abstract: This article builds on group position theory and the subcategorization model of intergroup contact by illustrating how, in a small-town settler-colonial context, contact tends to reproduce, rather ...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors move beyond the situational production of consent that has dominated studies of the labor process and outline the relational proclivity of workers to participate in their own exploitation.
Abstract: Why do workers participate in their own exploitation? This article moves beyond the situational production of consent that has dominated studies of the labor process and outlines the relational pro...
TL;DR: This paper investigated the relationship between three dimensions of welfare transfers (transfer share, low-income targeting, and universalism) and poverty and preferences for redistribution, and showed that poverty is negatively associated with transfer share, while universalism is positively associated with the transfer share.
Abstract: Korpi and Palme’s (1998) classic “The Paradox of Redistribution and Strategies of Equality” claims that universal social policy better reduces poverty than social policies targeted at the poor. This article revisits Korpi and Palme’s classic, and in the process, explores and informs a set of enduring questions about social policy, politics, and social equality. Specifically, we investigate the relationships between three dimensions of welfare transfers—transfer share (the average share of household income from welfare transfers), low-income targeting, and universalism—and poverty and preferences for redistribution. We analyze rich democracies like Korpi and Palme, but we also generalize to a broader sample of developed and developing countries. Consistent with Korpi and Palme, we show (1) poverty is negatively associated with transfer share and universalism; (2) redistribution preferences are negatively associated with low-income targeting; and (3) universalism is positively associated with transfer share...
TL;DR: The foreclosure crisis was patterned strongly along racial lines: black, Latino, and racially integrated neighborhoods had exceptionally high foreclosure rates andMultilevel models of racial/ethnic change reveal that foreclosure concentrations were linked to declining shares of whites and expanding shares of black and Latino residents.
Abstract: In this article, we use data on virtually all foreclosure events between 2005 and 2009 to calculate neighborhood foreclosure rates for nearly all block groups in the United States to assess the impact of housing foreclosures on neighborhood racial/ethnic change and on broader patterns of racial residential segregation. We find that the foreclosure crisis was patterned strongly along racial lines: black, Latino, and racially integrated neighborhoods had exceptionally high foreclosure rates. Multilevel models of racial/ethnic change reveal that foreclosure concentrations were linked to declining shares of whites and expanding shares of black and Latino residents. Results further suggest that these compositional shifts were driven by both white population loss and minority growth, especially from racially mixed settings with high foreclosure rates. To explore the impact of these racially selective migration streams on patterns of residential segregation, we simulate racial segregation assuming that foreclosu...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors conducted interviews with 115 low-wage EITC recipients and found that they valued the debt relief this government benefit brings, but also perceived it as a just reward for work, which legitimizes a temporary increase in consumption.
Abstract: Money has meaning that shapes its uses and social significance, including the monies low-income families draw on for survival: wages, welfare, and the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). This study, based on in-depth interviews with 115 low-wage EITC recipients, reveals the EITC is an unusual type of government transfer. Recipients of the EITC say they value the debt relief this government benefit brings. However, they also perceive it as a just reward for work, which legitimizes a temporary increase in consumption. Furthermore, unlike other means-tested government transfers, the credit is seen as a springboard for upward mobility. Thus, by conferring dignity and spurring dreams, the EITC enhances feelings of citizenship and social inclusion.
TL;DR: The authors empirically isolate media-level factors and examine their effects on women's coverage rates in hundreds of newspapers, finding that societal-level inequalities are the dominant determinants of continued gender differences in coverage.
Abstract: In the early twenty-first century, women continue to receive substantially less media coverage than men, despite women’s much increased participation in public life. Media scholars argue that actors in news organizations skew news coverage in favor of men and male-related topics. However, no previous study has systematically examined whether such media bias exists beyond gender ratio imbalances in coverage that merely mirror societal-level structural and occupational gender inequalities. Using novel longitudinal data, we empirically isolate media-level factors and examine their effects on women’s coverage rates in hundreds of newspapers. We find that societal-level inequalities are the dominant determinants of continued gender differences in coverage. The media focuses nearly exclusively on the highest strata of occupational and social hierarchies, in which women’s representation has remained poor. We also find that women receive greater exposure in newspaper sections led by female editors, as well as in ...
TL;DR: This paper examined the effect of relative earnings on infidelity, a marital outcome that has received little attention using data from the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSS) and found that, for men, breadwinning increases infidelity and breadwinning decreases infidelity.
Abstract: Recent years have seen great interest in the relationship between relative earnings and marital outcomes. Using data from the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, I examine the effect of relative earnings on infidelity, a marital outcome that has received little attention. Theories of social exchange predict that the greater one’s relative income, the more likely one will be to engage in infidelity. Yet, emerging literature raises questions about the utility of gender-neutral exchange approaches, particularly when men are economically dependent and women are breadwinners. I find that, for men, breadwinning increases infidelity. For women, breadwinning decreases infidelity. I argue that by remaining faithful, breadwinning women neutralize their gender deviance and keep potentially strained relationships intact. I also find that, for both men and women, economic dependency is associated with a higher likelihood of engaging in infidelity; but, the influence of dependency on men’s infidelity is greater...
TL;DR: This paper examined perspectives on science and religion in the United States using General Social Survey data, and found three groups based on knowledge and attitudes about science, re-satisfaction with science and religious beliefs.
Abstract: Using General Social Survey data, we examine perspectives on science and religion in the United States. Latent class analysis reveals three groups based on knowledge and attitudes about science, re...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose a measure of residential segregation that does not equate spatial with social proximity, which has been increasingly subject to critique among demographers and ethnographers and becomes...
Abstract: Standard measures of residential segregation tend to equate spatial with social proximity. This assumption has been increasingly subject to critique among demographers and ethnographers and becomes...
TL;DR: It is demonstrated that body mass in middle and late adulthood is a consequence of the complex interplay among individuals’ genes, lifetime socioeconomic experiences, and the historical context in which they live, as well as social changes during the obesity epidemic in the United States.
Abstract: This study demonstrates body mass in middle and late adulthood as a consequence of the complex interplay among individuals' genes, lifetime socioeconomic experiences, and the historical context in which they live. Drawing on approximately 9,000 genetic samples from the Health and Retirement Study, we first investigate how socioeconomic status (SES) over the life course moderates the impact of 32 established obesity-related genetic variants on body mass index (BMI) in middle and late adulthood. Further, we consider differences across birth cohorts in the genetic influence on BMI and cohort variations in the moderating effects of life-course SES on the genetic influence. Our analyses suggest that persistently low SES over the life course or downward mobility (e.g., high SES in childhood but low SES in adulthood) amplified the genetic influence on BMI, while persistently high SES or upward mobility (e.g., low SES in childhood but high SES in adulthood) compensated for such influence. For more recent birth cohorts, while the genetic influence on BMI became stronger, the moderating effects of lifetime SES on the genetic influence were weaker compared to earlier cohorts. We discuss these findings in light of social changes during the obesity epidemic in the United States.
TL;DR: For instance, this article showed that culture influences people's behavior, but estimating the exact extent of this influence poses a formidable methodological challenge for the social sciences, because preferences preferences are strongly influenced by culture.
Abstract: We know that culture influences people’s behavior. Yet estimating the exact extent of this influence poses a formidable methodological challenge for the social sciences. This is because preferences...
TL;DR: Theories within organizational and economic sociology that center on market categories often equate taken-for-grantedness with increased constraint on category members' features as discussed by the authors, which is not the case here.
Abstract: Theories within organizational and economic sociology that center on market categories often equate taken-for-grantedness with increased constraint on category members’ features. In contrast, we de...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on children as active agents in their socialization and introduce a two-step model of transmission: perception then adoption. But they do not consider the role of parents in political socialization.
Abstract: The transmission of party identification from parent to child is one of the most important components of political socialization in the United States. Research shows that children learn their party identification from their parents, and parents drive the learning process. The vast majority of studies thus treats children as passive recipients of information and assumes that parent-child concordance equals transmission. Rather than relying on a single pathway by which parents teach children, we propose an alternative view by focusing on children as active agents in their socialization. In so doing, we introduce a two-step model of transmission: perception then adoption. Utilizing two unique family-based studies that contain self-reported measures of party identification for both parents and children, children’s perceptions of their parents’ party affiliations, and measures of the parent-child relationship, we find children differentially learn and then choose to affiliate, or not, with their parents. These findings challenge several core assumptions upon which the extant literature is built, namely that the majority of children both know and adopt their parents’ party identification. We conclude that there is much to be learned by focusing on children as active agents in their political socialization.
TL;DR: In this paper, a meta-analysis and nonparametric bounding approach is used to reveal a domain of consensus for lawyers' effect on case outcomes and explore why this effect varies so greatly across past studies.
Abstract: Lawyers keep the gates of public justice institutions, particularly through their roles in formal procedures like hearings and trials. Yet, it is not clear what lawyers do in such quintessentially legal settings: conclusions from past research are bedeviled by a lack of clear theory and inconsistencies in research design. Conceptualizing litigation work in terms of professional expertise, I conduct a theoretically grounded synthesis of the findings of extant studies of lawyers’ impact on civil case outcomes. Using an innovative combination of statistical techniques—meta-analysis and nonparametric bounding—the present study transcends previous work to reveal a domain of consensus for lawyers’ effect on case outcomes and to explore why this effect varies so greatly across past studies. For the types of cases researched to date, knowledge of substantive law explains surprisingly little of lawyers’ advantage compared to lay people appearing unrepresented. Instead, lawyers’ impact is greatest when they assist ...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigate sit-in protest by black college students in the U.S. South in 1960, which targeted segregated lunch counters and find that protest greatly increased the probability of desegregation, as did protest in nearby cities.
Abstract: Can protest bring about social change? Although scholarship on the consequences of social movements has grown dramatically, our understanding of protest influence is limited; several recent studies have failed to detect any positive effect. We investigate sit-in protest by black college students in the U.S. South in 1960, which targeted segregated lunch counters. An original dataset of 334 cities enables us to assess the effect of protest while considering the factors that generate protest itself—including local movement infrastructure, supportive political environments, and favorable economic conditions. We find that sit-in protest greatly increased the probability of desegregation, as did protest in nearby cities. Over time, desegregation in one city raised the probability of desegregation nearby. In addition, desegregation tended to occur where opposition was weak, political conditions were favorable, and the movement’s constituency had economic leverage.
TL;DR: The U.S. multiracial population has grown substantially in the past decades, yet little is known about how these individuals are positioned in the racial hierarchies of the dating market as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The U.S. multiracial population has grown substantially in the past decades, yet little is known about how these individuals are positioned in the racial hierarchies of the dating market. Using dat...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on the direct effects of ratings systems that occur when ratings give k-means, i.e., when ratings are given by third-party evaluators.
Abstract: Organizations are increasingly subject to rating and ranking by third-party evaluators. Research in this area tends to emphasize the direct effects of ratings systems that occur when ratings give k...
TL;DR: This paper examined the relationship between income inequality and collective labor rights, conceptualized as workers' legal and practical ability to engage in collective activity, and found that strong labor rights are tightly linked to lower inequality across a large range of countries, including in the Global South.
Abstract: This article examines the relationship between income inequality and collective labor rights, conceptualized as workers’ legal and practical ability to engage in collective activity. Although worker organization is central to explaining income inequality in industrialized democracies, worldwide comparative studies have neglected the role of class-based actors. I argue that the repression of labor rights reduces the capacity of worker organizations to effectively challenge income inequality through market and political processes in capitalist societies. Labor rights, however, are unlikely to have uniform effects across regions. This study uses unbalanced panel data for 100 developed and less developed countries from 1985 through 2002. Random- and fixed-effects models find that strong labor rights are tightly linked to lower inequality across a large range of countries, including in the Global South. Interactions between regions and labor rights suggest that the broader context in which class-based actors a...