Informal Networks Social Capital of Fathers: What Does the Social Engagement Survey Tell Us?

Using the General Social Survey on Social Engagement conducted by Statistics Canada in 2003, this paper examines social capital derived from informal networks and its variation among men categorized as: (1) men with no children, and (2) men living with children in (a) intact, (b) step, and (c) lone parent families. The focus on men stems from a concern that their role in families has not been as extensively studied as that of women. The results show that married men living with children have higher social capital – measured in terms of the number of friends, relatives, and neighbors, and in their level of trust in them – than lone fathers or step fathers in cohabiting unions. Compared to child-free men, married fathers have higher social capital but also tend to have friends who are more similar to themselves in age, education, or income.     

Family Demography,Social Theory,and Investment in Social Capital

The analytic models used by family demographers would be strengthened by the concept of social capital, placed in the context of social exchange theory. Using that concept to designate resources that emerge from social ties, the authors advance five propositions: 1) social capital is a multidimensional attribute of an individual; 2) the dimensions of social capital are the number of relationships a person has, their quality (strength), and the resources available through those relationships; 3) group membership and interaction facilitate the development of social capital; 4) the structural properties of groups influence the development of social capital; and 5) the acquisition and maintenance of social capital is a major motivator of human behavior. The formation of sexual partnerships, the birth and rearing of children, and both intragenerational and intergenerational transfers constitute major forms of investment in social capital in virtually all societies.     

Residential Satisfaction and Civic Engagement: Understanding the Causes of Community Participation

In this paper, we seek to examine the causes of civic engagement, which refers to a set of actions and efforts, a feeling of belonging, and an experience of investment and ownership in local, regional, national, or international communities. We propose that research on the determinants of civic engagement has missed an important independent variable, which is residential satisfaction. Building upon insights from residential satisfaction research, we hypothesize that the more satisfaction an individual has with their community, the more likely it is that they will be civically engaged. We test this theory with a hierarchical regression model. While the regression produced mixed results, our findings suggest that satisfaction with social offerings leads to an increase in civic engagement.     

HIV/AIDS,Social Capital,and Online Social Networks

The prospects for online social networks as sites of information-gathering and affiliation for persons with AIDS and others concerned about HIV/AIDS not only represent the latest development in a trend toward circumventing traditional media and official information sources, but also may offer hope for a revitalization of HIV/AIDS discourse in the public sphere. This article provides an overview of three decades of information-seeking on the pandemic and its social and personal implications, as well as case studies of three examples of social networking surrounding HIV/AIDS. It finds preliminary evidence of the formation of strong and weak ties as described in Social Network Theory and suggests that the online accumulation of social capital by opinion leaders could facilitate dissemination of messages on HIV/AIDS awareness and testing.     

Measuring Social Capital in Hamilton, Ontario

Social capital has been studied by academics for more than 20?years and within the past decade there has been an explosion of growth in research linking social capital to health. This paper investigates social capital in Hamilton, Ontario by way of a telephone survey of 1,002 households in three neighbourhood groups representing high, mixed and low socio-economic status (SES). A Social Capital Measurement Tool is proposed as a straightforward way to account for differences in social capital perceptions and actions among residents. Consistent with the literature, the paper found that there was a strong association between social capital perceptions and health, particularly mental health and life stress. Social capital was greater in the high and mixed SES neighbourhoods and much weaker in the low SES neighbourhoods. With respect to social capital actions, both volunteering and voting was associated with positive overall health and mental health. Finally, the paper identified the social capital ??elite????respondents with high or above average perceptions and who participated in the two social capital actions??voting and volunteering. Prominent among the social capital elite in Hamilton is the ??health wealthy?? senior, a positive development for the continued social well-being of the city.     

Measuring Diversity in Daily Social Contact: The Contribution of Social Context,Work and Leisure on the Opportunity for Engagement

Role diversity is an important feature of individuals’ social networks that is reflected in the amount of time spent in the company of different role relationships. Time-use data is used to derive an index of dispersion measuring the diversity of one’s social contact among different role relationships. Patterns of social engagement are specialized when large investments of time are allocated to a small number of role relationships, while patterns are diverse when relatively equal amounts of time are spent among all possible role relationships. Tobit estimation of models indicates significant social context, time-use, and attitudinal effects on the diversity of role relationships. Findings indicate that role diversity is a complex phenomenon shaped by one’s existing social context, individual preferences, and present constraints on the use of time.     

人力资本、社会资本与高校毕业生就业质量

利用多个高校的第一手调查资料,从工资水平、就业单位类型和主观满意度等三个方面测量毕业生的就业质量,并把大学生的人力资本分解为学术性人力资本和实践性人力资本,他们的社会资本分解为家庭经济性资本和家庭社会性资本,具体考察人力资本和社会资本是否以及如何影响大学毕业生的就业质量.研究发现,大学生的人力资本和社会资本对他们工资水平和就业单位类型产生正向作用,但对就业的满意度则呈负面影响;另外,与社会资本相比,人力资本对大学生就业质量的影响更显著,结合大学生就业质量现状,本文也讨论了研究结论的政策含义.     

Social Capital and Subjective Wellbeing in Europe: A New Approach on Social Capital

This paper aims to analyze the relationship between the various dimensions of social capital and subjective wellbeing. Data used in this study come from the fourth wave of the European Social Survey and different measures of wellbeing are used to take account of both the cognitive and affective processes of individual wellbeing (i.e. life satisfaction, happiness, and subjective wellbeing). A factor analysis is performed to summarize information coming from a large set of variables into different components corresponding to each dimension of social capital (i.e. networks, norms, and trust). Among the results, we find that the impact of social capital on subjective wellbeing differ depending on the component of social capital which is under analysis. In particular, social networks, social trust and institutional trust are the components that show a higher correlation with subjective wellbeing. Furthermore, in addition to the positive effects of the individual variables, our results suggest that social capital at the aggregate level positively correlates with individual wellbeing, thus pointing to an external or environmental effect of social capital.     

The Compensating Income Variation of Social Capital

There is a small but growing literature on the determinants of social capital. Most of these studies use a measure of trust to define social capital empirically. In this paper we use three different measures of social capital: the size of the individual’s social network, the extent of their social safety net and membership of unions or associations. A second contribution to the literature is that we analyze what social capital contributes to our well-being. Based on this, we calculate the compensating income variation of social capital. We find differences in social capital when we differentiate according to individual characteristics such as education, age, place of residence, household composition and health. Household income generally has a statistically significant effect. We find a significant effect of social capital on␣life␣satisfaction. Consequently, the compensating income variation of social capital is substantial. Thanks to Tijl Woortman for his research assistance.     

Social Capital, Satisfaction and Quality of Life in the Workplace

This article is an empirical analysis of the relationship between social capital and satisfaction and quality of life in the workplace in Spain. Social capital has been defined as the set of cooperative relationships between social actors that facilitate collective action. This concept has been measured based on five dimensions: trust, social relations, commitment, communication and influence. An analysis has been carried out applying regression and causal models to determine the influence on satisfaction and quality of life at work of social capital dimensions and of characteristics of the worker, work environment and company or organization. The data is based on Spain's 2001 Quality of Life at Work Survey. The results of the analysis indicate that the models applied are significant, which confirms the examined propositions. Higher levels of social capital imply greater levels of satisfaction and quality of life at work. Social capital is a better predictor of quality of life at work and job satisfaction than the characteristics of the worker, the company or organization, and the work environment.     

Social Capital and Community Heterogeneity

Recent findings indicate that more pronounced community heterogeneity is associated with lower levels of social capital. These studies, however, concentrate on specific aspects in which people differ (such as income inequality or ethnic diversity). In the present paper, we introduce the number of parties in the local party system as a more encompassing measure of community heterogeneity. This builds on the argument that the number of relevant socio-economic cleavages in the population (i.e. heterogeneity) determines the level of party system fragmentation. Using data on 307 Flemish municipalities, we find that municipalities with a more heterogeneous population indeed have lower levels of social capital. Hence, our study endorses—and generalizes—previous results linking community heterogeneity to lower levels of social capital.

The Correlates of Self-Assessed Community Belonging in Canada: Social Capital,Neighbourhood Characteristics,and Rootedness

This study examines the extent to which a single-item question on sense of community belonging captures the multi-dimensionality of the underlying concept. Many studies use multi-item scales to measure the different dimensions of this concept, but including extensive questions on community belonging in large surveys is often impractical given constraints on survey lengths and budgets. Having an economical and robust measure provides considerable scope for future studies to consider the effects of community belonging without reliance on multi-item scales. Drawing on several large, nationally representative Canadian surveys, the study shows that self-assessed community belonging is a parsimonious measure of a broad range of factors that pertain to local social relations, neighbourhood characteristics, and place attachment. Social capital yields the strongest correlations, and also plays an important mediating role vis-à-vis other variables. However, neighbourhood characteristics (e.g., perceptions of area crime, the built environment) and “rootedness” (e.g., duration of residence in an area) are also significantly correlated with sense of community belonging, independent of individuals’ strength of social capital.     

Social Capital in Old-Age and the Role of the Social Marginalisation

Social Indicators Research - In India, despite heavy constitutional protection, due to caste-based discrimination, millions of residents are still struggling to access their basic rights such as...     

Measurement of Social Participation and its Place in Social Capital Theory

The concept of social capital has become very popular but its definition and measurement are still rather unclear. We frame our study in one of its components, social participation. In this article we develop an optimal measure for social participation based on the questions asked in the first round of the European Social Survey. Our analyses suggest that a distinction has to be made between informal and formal participation because they relate very differently to other variables such as age, education, political action and happiness. We also found that these two types of participation had hardly any relationship with other important components of the social capital construct, such as social trust and political trust. The latter result does not devalue the validity of the developed indices for informal and formal participation but suggests that participation and trust should be considered formative indicators of social capital.     

Social Capital,Economic Development,and Homicide: A Cross-National Investigation

This article draws from an ongoing debate over explanations of homicide. Within this debate, we investigate the pro-social effects of civil society and social capital. Few cross-national studies explore whether elements of social capital either increase or decrease homicide. The cross-national work that does is often characterized by small, homogeneous samples and the use of inappropriate statistical techniques. Replicating elements of Lederman et al.’s (Econ Dev Cult Change 50:509–539, 2002) original study but with wave IV World Values Survey data and negative binomial regression, we find weak support for the beneficial consequences of social capital on homicide. One dimension of social capital, however, does exhibit a significant negative association with homicide rates, net of other influences: social activism. We also fail to support the Durkheimian hypothesis that the negative effect of social capital on homicide is conditional on modernization. We explore the implications of the findings along with avenues for future research.     

The Impact of Social Capital on Household Well-being in Pakistan

Social Indicators Research - The main purpose is to check the impact of social capital on households’ objective well-being in the context of a developing country like Pakistan. The primary...     

社会保障与人力资本投资

社会保障和人力资本的关系已经成为近年劳动经济学理论研究的热点。文章以中国养老保险的“统账结合”运作模式为例,分析了社会保障对人力资本投资的影响,并结合中国分割的社会保障现状,对城乡人力资本投资的现状进行了解释。分析结果显示,中国应该建立覆盖全国的社会保障体系;把农村社会保障的建立放在首要的位置;适当增加“统账结合”的社会保障模式中个人账户的比例。     

Social Capital,Diversity and Giving or Receiving Help Among Neighbours

In this paper we look at the links between social capital and helping neighbours or receiving help from neighbours. Our data are drawn from the 2003 and 2008 Canadian General Social Surveys, both of which looked at linkages across social networks. In particular, we examine the relationship between municipal, neighbourhood and individual level ethnicity social capital formation and the level of helping amongst neighbours. Using a combination of factor analysis and random intercept model regressions, we find a strong link between social capital formation and helping, but do not find strong links between diversity, social capital and helping. This suggests that previous research, which found strong links between diversity and social capital, may be overstated.