A typology of lifestyles

Lifestyle, currently a popular lay term but not an important construct within the social sciences, is examined briefly. Two studies designed to explore a lifestyle typology using personal projects methodology are reported. In the first study, three distinct lifestyle types were identified among a large community sample. They were tentatively labelled pressured, relaxed, and wishful thinking lifestyles. In the second stuty, these types were replicated for a university student group, with two types of a relaxed lifestyle being revealed.Four lifestyle types were found among those in the university sample reporting high subjective well-being. They were tentatively labelled hedonistic, adventuristic, individualistic, and promethean. A preliminary analysis of a variety of demographic and socioeconomic variables using the four types for the subsample reporting high well-being revealed age and sex differences. Young respondents tended to be assigned to the hedonistic and adventuristic types, while older respondents tended to be assigned to the promethean type. Women tended to be assigned to hedonistic type. The results and some implications for further research are discussed.     

The influence of peers and parents on youth life satisfaction in Hong Kong

This investigation attempts to measure the relative influence of peer and parental influence on the perceived life satisfaction of two groups of secondary students in Hong Kong. Data on 1906 students from 30 schools were collected through the use of a self-administered questionnaire. Respondents were asked to rate their level of satisfaction on 26 different domains of life on a seven-point scale, ranging from very satisfied to very dissatisfied, as well as their satisfaction with life in general. These 26 items were combined to form six summary indices of life satisfaction: school life, family life, acceptance by others, government, media, and living environment. Two independent variables were used in the analysis of life satisfaction: peer orientation, and parent orientation. Both are composite indices and measure the adolescent's attachment to and identification with his peers or parents. It was found that parent orientation is a better predictor of life satisfaction than peer orientation. Adolescents who are high on parent orientation are more satisfied with every domain of life. They are also more satisfied with life in general. The relationship between peer orientation and life satisfaction is not a clear-cut one. Adolescents with strong peer orientation are more satisfied with school, media, government, and acceptance by others, but are less satisfied with family. There is no significant relationship between peer orientation and environment. The younger adolescents in our sample tend to perceive a higher level of satisfaction than the older adolescents in every domain of life as well as life in general.     

Social Development Trends in the Middle East, 1970–1997: the Search for Modernity

The nations of the Middle East have arrived at a historic crossroad.Anchored in centuries-old political and economic systems, bitterethnic rivalries, recurrent intra-regional warfare, and risingfundamentalism, the majority of the regions countries haveremained largely apart from the transformative processes that areshaping development in other world regions. Indeed, the impressionexists that no development miracles are occurring in theMiddle East and that, to a very great extent, the region isseeking to remain on the sidelines of modern history. And,yet, if the countries of the Middle East are to flourish in thenext century they, too, must restructure themselves for dealingwith the complex realities associated with increasing globalizationand internationalization. This paper reports on the socialdevelopment successes and failures of 22 Middle Eastern countriesbetween 1970 and 1997. Also identified are the regions SocialLeaders (SLs), Socially Least Developing Countries (SLDCs),and Middle Performing Countries (MPCs). The social, political,and economic factors most closely associated with each countrysdevelopment classification are identified.     

A special section for correspondence and controversy

Editor's Note: This update was prepared before devaluation of the Mexican currency impaired Mexico's capacity to import U.S. goods and services, which had been the primary benefit expected from the NAFTA.     

“Consumer Confidence” Indexes as social indicators

Consumer Confidence Indexes can be sensibly used in economic and social research conducted in theoretical and methodological framework of social indicators research. They are good predictors of other attitudes, such as voting preferences. Voting preferences are determined much more strongly by expectations of changes in economic conditions than by evaluations of present situation. On the other hand, Consumer Sentiment Indexes — irrespective whether they concern future or present times — are correlated more strongly with leading than with coincident indexes of economic cycles. That proves very important role of predictions, expectations and hopes in attitude formation.     

Transnational Grannies: The Changing Family Responsibilities of Elderly African Caribbean-Born Women Resident in Britain

This paper explores the role and position of grandmothers in African-Caribbean families resident in Britain. The data used for this paper comes fromm a sample of 180 life-history interviews collected in 1995–1996 from three generations of Caribbean-origin people living in Britain and the Caribbean. Findings from this research suggest that African-Caribbean grandmothers resident in Britain have come to play a less active role within their immediate family compared to earlier historical periods. At the same time however, these grandmothers have come to take on a more a transnational emissary role for their family and kin located throughout North America and Europe. Caribbean-born grandmothers appear to be using more modern means for fulfilling certain traditional tasks like child shifting, story telling or acting as a social safety net. Using their agency African Caribbean-born grandmothers have been able to carve out new niches for themselves despite changes in family structure brought about by migration and settlement patterns in Britain.     

A crime based analysis and classification of 729 American cities

Thirty social indicators, consisting of crime rates and variables which may be regarded theoretically as correlates of crime, are factor analyzed for 729 incorporated American cities with a minimum population of 25000. Factors associated with crime, poverty, native-born status, city revenue, residential stability, home construction, city size, and population age are identified. The data matrix is partitioned in order to identify high crime and low crime cities. The cities in each category are then subjected to cluster analysis on the basis of the seven socioeconomic factors, and the resulting groups are investigated further in order to identify distinctive clusters and underlying patterns of social conditions. A group of model low crime communities is identified — virtually all were incorporated white noose suburbs of metropolitan areas. Residential instability and large population size are associated with two of the high crime groups, which include stereotypical crime problem cities such as Detroit, Chicago, and Kansas City. The member cities constituting each of the eight groups are documented, and the policy implications of the findings are discussed.     

Beyond IPAT and Kuznets Curves: Globalization as a Vital Factor in Analysing the Environmental Impact of Socio-Economic Metabolism

We bring the rapidly developing tools for analyzing society's metabolism to the attention of a scientific audience concerned with matters of population and, in a complementary fashion, we draw the attention of material and energy flow analysts to the role of population and population dynamics within their own paradigm. As an analytic framework, we use the classic IPAT-model that relates environmental impact (I), population (P), affluence (A), and technology (T). We relate the IPAT model to the tool commonly used in MFA, so-called environmental Kuznets curves, and re-analyze empirical data from various sources, for both affluent industrial and for developing countries, within these frameworks. We conclude that population and technology seem to dominate over affluence as far as environmental impact is concerned, but that both the IPAT and Kuznets models fail to take into account the intricate interdependencies among different socio-economic systems and the increases in their the economic, material and population exchanges. In effect, both models tend to underestimate the environmental impact and create too optimistic an image of dematerialization in affluent industrial countries.     

Optimally Scaled Quality-of-Life Indicators

When studying quality of life, researchers have to rely on the subjective evaluations, which are typically categorized, collected in surveys. When statistical analysis are applied to these data, they used to apply the simplistic approach including (i) direct quantification, which assigns discrete numerical values to ordinal response scale, and (ii) complete-case analysis, which discards all observations selecting any of the off-scales choices like Dont Know No Answer from the analysis. The present paper examines the disadvantages of this approach and introduces the optimal scaling method as a remedy. The new scheme attempts to restore the continuity property of the measurements as well as provide estimates for most of the missing responses. Application of the new scheme to the Hong Kong QOL data illustrates how the scheme works, demonstrates its advantages and shows how the QOL indicators, the global QOL indicator as well as its inherited indicators, can be constructed from series of principal component analyses. Factor analysis of the 20 life domain indicators verifies Wan's opinion (1992) that the global sense of well-being can best be captured by two dimensions, namely the personal well-being and the societal well-being. Although previous QOL studies had seldom included perceptions towards various societal conditions to identify life satisfaction in general, our data analysis shows that satisfaction on these conditions do constitute an important component of the global QOL.     

Change in the stressfulness of life in American states and regions from 1976 to 1982

The State Stress Index (SSI) described in this paper^I measures difference between the states of the United States, and differences over time, in the occurrence of stressful life events. The method of constructing the SSI is described and the scores for each of the American states in 1976 and 1982 are presented. There are large differences between the states in the stressfulness of life. The construct validity of the SSI was supported by analysis which show that the higher the SSI, the higher the incidence of behaviors that have long been assumed to be affected by stress, such as violence and heavy smoking and drinking, and suicide. Scores on the SSI revealed an increase in the stressfulness of life between 1976 and 1982, largely due to the economic recession in 1982. Despite this the 1982 rank order of the states was essentially the same as their relative position in 1976. The West remained the most stressful region of the United States, despite its other attractions, and the North Central and North East remained the least stressful regions, despite their rustbelt and frostbelt images.     

Exponential Population Growth and Doubling Times: Are They Dead or Merely Quiescent?

Exponential Growth and Doubling Times: Use of these popular population buzzwords of the last half of the twentieth century was fully justified by the growth rates of that period. However, those growth rates have now all but disappeared and so have the underlying reasons that those buzzwords made sense. Misuse of such expressions today costs credibility. Though the world's population growth certainly does remain vigorous and robust, creating many reasons for concern, nowhere today is growth projected as exponential. The essence of exponential growth is analyzed and distinguished from exponential curves, and non-exponential growth. Several types of current population growth are recognized, none being exponential. In periods of non-exponential growth, a Doubling Time calculated from a single annual growth rate is grossly erroneous and often absurd. Other standard measures of growth are needed. United Nations projections should include figures for percentage growth by 2025 and 2050.     

Immigration and internal migration “flight”: A California case study

Recent analyses of 1990 census migration data have pointed up disparities in the way immigration and internal migration contributions affect an area's demographic profile. They show that there is little overlap between states with large population gains from internal migration from other parts of the United States and states with large population gains from immigration from abroad. This emerging pattern, along with the fact that immigration and internal migration select on very different demographic characteristics, could lead toward a demographic balkanization of the nation's population. This paper evaluates immigration-induced out-movement from California, based on an analysis of recently released migration data from the 1990 U.S. census. The results presented here suggest that California's out-migration consists of two different migration systems: first, an immigration-induced flight that exports lower income and less-educated Californians, primarily, to the nearby states of Washington, Oregon, Nevada and Arizona. And second, a more conventional migration exchange with the rest of the United States that involves the redistribution of better educated, higher income migrants. It is the former migration system which appears to be most responsive to the low-skilled immigration flows, while the latter should be responsive to more conventional labor market employment characteristics. This implies that, irrespective of changing economic conditions in the state, the continued immigration of low-skilled migrants will lead to more losses of native-born internal migrants to neighboring states and metropolitan areas. However, these migrant streams will not be made up of the best and brightest residents that characterize most conventional migration streams.A longer version of this report with more extensive background statistics isResearch Report 94–306 (Frey, 1994b) available from Publications, Population Studies Center, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48104.     

Population in context: A typology of environmental driving forces

This paper presents a typology and qualitative model of causation for use in assessing the relative contributions of population growth to problems of pollution, lost biodiversity, and natural resource depletion. Population growth is placed in context as one of eight key driving forces that shape environmental quality today. It is treated primarily as an impact amplifier, along with technology. Root causes are traced to paradigmatic beliefs—especially anthropocentrism and contempocentrism—which find expression in unsustainable consumption patterns and designs of political economy.     

An evaluation of socially responsive planning in a new resource town

New resource towns on the Canadian frontier have presented planners with opportunities to experiment with innovative planning ideas which attempt to resolve the persistent problems of such communities. In the planning of Tumbler Ridge, a new coal mining town in British Columbia, socially responsive planning was an attempt to develop a town using principles derived from social science research. In this paper the reactions of residents to selected attributes which reflect the application of these principles are examined five years after settlement began. Ratings of community attributes offer an indication of aspects of residential satisfaction, while the results of a principal components analysis suggest the dimensionality of residents' evaluative structures and provide a useful framework within which to consider planning issues. Issues examined are: the association between employment and the community environment; the suitability of the environment for children; and the social environment. While social aspects of the new community are judged as satisfactory, less positive elements reflect the underlying influence of the economic well-being of the mining company on overall community satisfaction. When compared to indicators of community satisfaction in other western Canadian resource towns, ratings for Tumbler Ridge tend to be fairly low. It is concluded that the inability of planners to adequately control implementation or dontinuity of their ideas has resulted in a community not distinctly different from other resource towns. Efforts have been further hampered by a lack of adequate models of the distinctive dynamics of resource communities.     

Do some authoritarian governments foster physical quality of life?

A recent claim that the populations of populist authoritarian governments have relatively high physical quality of life is tested empirically and found to be true. Analysis of life expectancy in 103 countries shows that although political rights contribute to the prediction of life expectancy, net of GNP per capita, one category of authoritarian governments, here called the constrained authoritarians, has higher than expected physical quality of life. Of interest is the additional finding that location in sub-Saharan Africa has a strong negative impact on life expectancy, net of GNP and political rights.I appreciate the contributions to this paper of Linda Bush, Rebecca Miles Doan, Eugene Erickson, Joe Francis, Donald Freebairn, Victor Nee and Linda Jacobsen.     

A simple method for projecting or estimating α and β: An extension of the Brass Relational Gompertz Fertility Model

This paper proposes a simple method that analytically links the parameters and , which are not demographically interpretableand measurable in the Brass Relational Gompertz Fertility Model, with demographic measures of median age and interquartile range. We also extend the Brass model that deals only with age-specific fertility to age-parity-specific fertility, first marriage, divorce, remarriage, and leaving the parental home. The method has been successfully tested by fittings to 180 reliable observed demographic schedules in various countries and periods, and to nearly 10,000simulated schedules with various combinations of possible values (including the extremes) of and . Our proposed method that uses median age and interquartile range instead of and as input is useful in the population and family household projections. It releases the traditionalunrealistic assumption in population projections that the curve of the fertility schedule moves to the right or left in a parallel way. Instead, using our proposed method, one can assume that the demographic events would be delayed or advanced, while the curve becomes more spread or more concentrated, or, more specifically, assume that young people delay the events more than the older persons do, or vice versa. Our proposed method is also useful to formulate assumptions on future demographic trends for purposes of policy analysisand planning. It can be used to indirectly estimate demographic schedules when the detailed age-specific data are not currently available, which is useful for developing countries and sub-region studies in developed countries. A crucial point for a successful application of the method is that the standard schedule chosen can capture the general pattern of the demographic process in the population under study.     

Quality of Life in Older Adults: Benefits from Caring Services in Hong Kong

Many older adults are in need of care. Therefore, older people would generally benefit from the use of caring services, notably including home care, residential care, nursing, and medical services. The contributory factors underlying caring services tend to be a caring perspective that aspires to sustain older peoples social relationships and real-life involvement. To gauge the benefits from various social and health services, the present study relies on a large-scale survey of 3000 older adults in Hong Kong, using quality of life as a criterion. Results showed that an older adult who had used (ordinary or enhanced) home care services for a longer time turned out to have appreciably more improvement in quality of life. Besides, those who joined an interest group more frequently were higher in quality of life, including the health domain. On the other hand, frequent use of medical and meal-to-home services were signals that reflected problems detrimental to the older users quality of life. Despite this, the quality of clinics or hospitals, as perceived by the older adult, was the most beneficial. As such, caring services that foster older adults interests, cater to their health care needs, and embody quality can have principal contribution to their users quality of life.     

Is subjective well-being a predictor of nonresponse in broad population surveys?

In connection with a medical screening operation for hypertension and diabetes among all adults (20+) in a medium-sized Norwegian county, all screenees were required to fill in a questionnaire containing questions about subjective well-being (overall life satisfaction and self-assessed health). Since screenees in practice constituted a captive audience, questionnaire data are available for an unusually large proportion (88%) of the eligible population (N=71 896). Information about socioeconomic background could be obtained for all screenees through record-linking. A second questionnaire was handed to all screenees as they left the screening site. The response rate (by mail) for this second questionnaire was quite normal, appr. 80%. Working on the assumption that nonresponders and/or late responders for the second questionnaire are representative of persons not responding in ordinary broad population surveys, nonresponse biases in the means, variances and covariances of our measures (in the first questionnaire and the outside records) could be investigated. Bivariate results showed a slight overrepresentation of screenees with poor self-assessed health among those who returned the second questionnaire promptly by mail. However, multivariate analyses controlling for the age composition of person with less favorable self-assessed health reversed this pattern completely so that the onlydirect effect from subjective well-being remaining is a very slight tendency for persons in poor self-assessed health to fail to cooperate.Paper presented at the XII World Congress of Sociology, Madrid, July 8–13, 1990.Data for this study has been collected under the auspices of the Norwegian Head of National Health Screening Service. The research reported herein has been financed by the Norwegian Research Council for Science and the Humanities.     

Assessing state population projections with transparent multiregional demographic models

Population projection models that are conceptually simple enough to be called transparent may be used to check the validity of projections generated by black box models whose behavior may be somewhat shrouded in mystery. This paper adopts a multiregional demographic model to illustrate how such a validation procedure might be carried out on state population projections produced by the U.S. Bureau of the Census in 1988.