Adolescent girls’ race/ethnic status, identities, and drive for thinness

Using data from 7272 adolescent US girls, we explore how girls’ race/ethnic group status affects their bodyweight, perceptions of overweight, and weight control practices. We hypothesize that a girl’s race/ethnic status influences her basic identity which in turn prompts her to adopt or reject a “drive for thinness.” After controlling for family and peer support, school engagement, family SES, maturation, and family structure, we find that girls’ race/ethnic status influences their susceptibility to the thinness ideals of mainstream culture. African American girls weigh more than Asian, Hispanic, or White girls, but at any given weight they perceive themselves as overweight and attempt to control their weight less. Asian American and White girls invest most in thinness dynamics. Some evidence also suggests girls from lower SES families are less driven to be thin. Our results affirm the utility of viewing material bodies as “situations” that are experienced and interpreted in accord with identity group relations and dynamics.     

Minding the gap: Meaning, affect, and the potential shortcomings of vignettes

Despite an ongoing debate over the validity of vignettes, little research has explored either why, or in what research areas, the vignette method may be particularly problematic. In this paper, we draw on Affect Control Theory (ACT) to directly investigate the difference between vignettes and a more experiential method in research on social exchange and alternative dispute resolution. Using ACT’s affective dimensions of evaluation, potency, and activity, as well as its concept of deflection, we compare the affective responses of participants in two types of experimental simulations - vignettes and a laboratory experiment. Results suggest that a more tangible experience, like that present in our laboratory experiment, leads to greater deflection, therefore increasing the intensity of emotion and altering affective meanings. We argue that these findings could have important implications for research, particularly in areas exploring affective and cognitive outcomes of interaction.     

Invisible norms? Statistics of racial polarization and consensus

Social scientists often arrive at opposite portrayals of American race relations, despite relying on identical data sources. Depending on their ideological predispositions, they either minimize or maximize remaining racial inequalities. The election of President Obama suggests that the reality of American race relations likely falls somewhere in between - but where?This paper applies a simple method of comparing racial gaps across domains on a shared metric. Results suggest that non-violence represents a shared norm rendered invisible by traditional data presentation formats that exaggerate existing ‘crime gaps.’ Other racial gaps are more substantial, e.g., in education, income, and race-related public opinion. However, even in these domains Black-White agreement (group concordance) tends to outweigh disagreement (group discordance). Exceptions are monetary reparations for slavery and presidential approval ratings of Obama. Thus, characterizations of America as ‘post-racial’ seem premature. However, given that racial equality (once achieved) will marked by group concordance and shared norms, equality measures should capture emerging commonalities in addition to remaining gaps.     

论公正的初次分配规则

公正的初次分配规则最为直接地、直观地体现了公正原则的兑现程度。公正的初次分配规则具有如下几个基本特征:一、强调"付出"同"获得"之间的对称;二、凸显个体人依靠自身的成就所获得的回报;三、社会成员在收入等社会资源分配方面的差距相对较大;四、其地位的重要性随着现代化程度的提高而有所相对降低。公正的初次分配规则能否有效地得以实施,取决于:一、相应的制度设计和实施是否公正;二、社会成员平等的基本权利是否具备;三、当事群体之间是否有一个有效的、公平的谈判与协商的机制。     

Uneven transitions: Period- and cohort-related changes in gender attitudes in China, 1995-2007

This paper analyzes temporal variations in two gender attitudes in China: beliefs about gender equality and perspectives on women’s combined work and family roles. It uses the most currently available population series from the 1995, 2001 and 2007 World Value Surveys of 4500 respondents and a series of multilevel cross-classified models to properly estimate period and cohort effects. Attitudes toward women’s dual roles manifest neither period nor cohort effects; the population displays a universal high level of acceptance of women’s paid employment. Orientations toward gender equality manifest both cohort and period effects: members of the youngest cohort of both sexes hold the most liberal attitudes; the positive effect of college education has increased over time. Attitude toward gender equality in China displays neither a shift toward conservatism nor an over-time trend toward egalitarianism in 1995-2007, a time of rapid economic growth.     

Roommate’s race and the racial composition of white college students’ ego networks

We develop and test a new hypothesis about how the race of a college freshman’s roommate affects the racial composition of the student’s ego network. Together, three principles of social structure—proximity, homophily, and transitivity—logically imply that college students assigned a roommate of a given race will have more friends (other than their roommate) of that race than will students assigned a roommate not of that race. A test with data collected from 195 white freshmen at Stanford University in the spring of 2002 supports this prediction. Our analysis advances earlier work by predicting and providing evidence of race-specific effects: While students assigned a different-race roommate of a given race have more friends (other than their roommate) of their roommate’s race, they do not have more different-race friends not of their roommate’s race.     

论马克思恩格斯关于教育公平的社会基础及其当代意蕴

马克思恩格斯所阐述的教育公平问题主要表现为“教育的平等性”问题,而教育平等的社会基础主要来自政治平等、经济平等、社会和谐三个方面。这三个方面的思想内涵不仅为研究现代教育公平问题奠定了理论基础,而且为现代教育公平所倡导的“教育起点公平”、“教育过程公平”和“教育结果公平”确定了逻辑起点。     

Women’s status and carbon dioxide emissions: A quantitative cross-national analysis

Global climate change is one of the most severe problems facing societies around the world. Very few assessments of the social forces that influence greenhouse gas emissions have examined gender inequality. Empirical research suggests that women are more likely than men to support environmental protection. Various strands of feminist theory suggest that this is due to women’s traditional roles as caregivers, subsistence food producers, water and fuelwood collectors, and reproducers of human life. Other theorists argue that women’s status and environmental protection are linked because the exploitation of women and the exploitation of nature are interconnected processes. For these theoretical and empirical reasons, we hypothesize that in societies with greater gender equality there will be relatively lower impacts on the environment, controlling for other factors. We test this hypothesis using quantitative analysis of cross-national data, focusing on the connection between women’s political status and CO₂ emissions per capita. We find that CO₂ emissions per capita are lower in nations where women have higher political status, controlling for GDP per capita, urbanization, industrialization, militarization, world-system position, foreign direct investment, the age dependency ratio, and level of democracy. This finding suggests that efforts to improve gender equality around the world may work synergistically with efforts to curtail global climate change and environmental degradation more generally.     

Foreign-born health integration during the transition to adulthood: The case of weight

Nativity differences in youths’ health in the United States are striking—the children of foreign-born parents often have healthier outcomes than those of native-born parents. However, very little is known about how immigrant-native differences evolve within the same individuals over time, or about life cycle aspects of the health-related integration of youth with migration backgrounds. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, I examine nativity differences in trajectories of weight gain during adolescence and early adulthood, as well as the degree to which temporal patterns are stratified by race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status. I examine whether nativity differences converge, diverge or remain stable over time, and whether patterns are socially stratified within and across nativity groups. I find that first-generation adolescents begin at a lower weight than their third generation peers and gain weight at a significantly slower pace, resulting in meaningful differences by early adulthood. More complex examination of the relationship between nativity and weight gain reveals additional differences by ethnicity: the foreign-born advantage over time does not extend as strongly to Hispanic adolescents. The findings demonstrate how the health-related integration of foreign-born youth is tied to race/ethnicity and socioeconomic circumstances, and suggest the need to examine the ways in which social circumstances and health change together.     

Motivation vs. relevance: Using strong ties to find a job in Urban China

While the idea that contacts matter in finding a job is intuitively appealing, we still do not know—after decades of research—how and why strong ties benefit job seekers. To resolve this confusion, we need to theorize how specific characteristics of ties are related to the mechanisms that make job search through contacts effective. We have reasons to expect that, while a contact’s motivation influences the likelihood that a job seeker receives an offer, her homophily with the job seeker on occupation and other job-relevant attributes influences the quality of the offer. The use of strong ties among university students to find jobs in China provides a unique opportunity to empirically isolate the relationship between contact characteristics and the mechanisms through which contacts benefit the job seeker. I tested my hypotheses with data on both the successful and unsuccessful job searches of 478 graduates of China’s flagship universities, who, as first-time job seekers, primarily used strong ties. Survey results are consistent with my hypotheses: job seekers who used strong ties to look for jobs had more offers—but not better offers—than those who used only formal methods.     

秦汉户籍中的"宗室属籍"

秦汉户籍中身份等级最高的是皇族成员的宗室属籍。无论是居于京师的皇族,还是散居各郡国的宗室成员的户籍都归宗正掌管,各地要按时上报宗室户籍,是为上计制度的重要内容。并非所有皇族及后裔都具有宗室属籍,谋反者及其家属、毋节行者、五服之外者不具备宗室属籍。不仅有皇族血统者有宗室属籍,与皇室有姻亲关系者也可有宗室属籍,或称之"准宗室属籍"。宗室也不单纯是个自然的血缘或姻缘概念,还可以是人为刻意制造而成,即宣布没有皇族血统的人为宗室。秦汉宗室有属籍者数量相对有限,没像宋明那样出现宗室泛滥为患的局面,因而被后世称道。     

晚明小品折射的文人心态

从某种角度来说,晚明小品是晚明文人心态的一面镜子,轻灵的小品可以折射出变乱纷呈的晚明文人复杂多样的心态。异端倾向、末世情怀、自娱心态、遗民心绪,依次展现了晚明文人丰富而真实的生命状态。     

He said, she said: The gender wage gap according to self and proxy reports in the Current Population Survey

Roughly half the labor force data in the Current Population Survey (CPS) are provided by proxy respondents, and since 1979, men’s reliance on proxies has dropped dramatically while women’s reliance on proxies has increased. Few authors, however, have examined how combining these first-hand and second-hand reports may influence our understanding of long-term economic trends. We exploit the outgoing rotation group structure of the CPS by matching individual records one year apart, and we find that self-reported wages are higher than proxy-reported wages even after controlling for all time invariant characteristics. Furthermore, we find that changes in the use of proxy respondents by men and women since 1979 have made current estimates of the gender wage gap larger than they would have been without changes in reporting status. This suggests that the gender wage gap has closed more than previously estimated. We recommend that researchers combine self and proxy responses with great care, especially when analyzing time trends or making gender comparisons.     

Another cost of being a young black male: Race, weaponry, and lethal outcomes in assaults

We examine the effect of the race, age, and gender of victims of assault on the offenders’ use of weapons and lethal intent. Evidence from the National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS) suggests that offenders are particularly likely to use guns against young black men—a three-way interaction - and to kill black males and young black adults. Black offenders respond more strongly to the victim’s race than do white offenders. As a result of these effects, a violent incident between two young black men is about six times more likely to involve a gun than a violent incident between two young white men. We suggest that adversary effects, i.e., an offender’s tactical response to the threat posed by adversaries, help explain why violence in black communities tends to be much more serious than violence in white communities.     

Deriving equity from expectations: A cross-cultural evaluation

This paper develops and evaluates a new model for predicting just rewards. The model produces point predictions for individual just rewards based on status characteristics and the expected value of a valued good. The equity model borrows from Berger and colleagues’ (1998) reward expectations theory the ability to define different reward expectations. Drawing from Melamed and Walker’s (2010) recent generalization of the mathematics of reward expectations theory, I illustrate how the model generates a continuous distribution of just rewards. The general model is applied to data from thirteen countries using the International Social Justice Project. The results illustrate the predictive power of the model using data from over 10,000 respondents. Implications and future directions are discussed.     

Estimations of parental and self intelligence as a function of parents’ status: A cross-cultural study in Germany and Spain

With reference to the extensively reported gender differences in estimated intelligence, we used a cross-cultural study to investigate whether employment status and education of mothers and fathers (at the time of data collection, in early childhood, and in later childhood) influenced the estimation of parents’ general intelligence. Data showed that mothers’ as well as fathers’ general intelligence was significantly predicted by their education and current employment status. We additionally found a similar relationship between women’s (men’s) and mothers’ (fathers’) intelligence compared with the relationship of intelligence ascribed to their fathers (mothers). Furthermore, women’s self-estimated intelligence was significantly predicted by their mothers’ current employment, whereas men’s self-estimated intelligence was predicted by their fathers’ education. We furthermore investigated how women’s and men’s estimations differ between Germany and Spain. Results indicate that the more pronounced gender segregation in Spain was not expressed in larger gender differences in self- or parents’ intelligence estimations.     

同质性与异质性对农民专业合作社的影响——基于俱乐部理论的研究

随着改革开放的深入和经济的活跃,传统合作社社员结构相对同质的假定已经发生了变化,异质化成为不可阻挡的、并将长期存在的趋势。其中,利益的同质性是合作社形成的前提,投入品和产出品的同质性是社员联合的基础,社员同质性促进社员认同的形成。异质性对合作社的影响则有负有正:对稀缺资源的激励与公平的权衡、委托代理问题、决策成本与缔约成本的增加、抵减规模经济的作用等是异质性对合作社的负面影响;但同时,异质性又有利于促进合作社的形成,有利于社员之间的学习与互补,起到了提高合作社效率的作用。     

The diversity dividends of a need-blind and color-blind affirmative action policy

In the early to mid-2000s, four flagship Israeli selective universities incorporated a need-blind and color-blind affirmative action policy into their admissions practices. The program, which gives an edge in admission to academically borderline applicants from disadvantaged backgrounds, emphasizes structural disadvantages, such as neighborhood socioeconomic status and high school rigor. The results of this study, based on administrative data from the four universities, demonstrate that having such a policy in place made the four institutions, especially the echelons at the most selective departments, more diverse than they otherwise would have been. The rise in geographic, economic and demographic diversity of a student population suggests that the plan’s focus on structural determinants of disadvantage yields broad diversity dividends. The paper discusses the relevance of the findings to the ongoing discussion of admission regimes, diversity and equality of opportunity in the US.     

White ethnic residential segregation in historical perspective: US cities in 1880

Investigating immigrant residential patterns in 1880 offers a baseline for understanding residential assimilation trajectories in subsequent eras. This study uses 100% count information from the 1880 Census to estimate a multilevel model of ethnic isolation and exposure to native whites in 67 cities for individual Irish, German and British residents. At the individual level, the key predictors are drawn from assimilation theory: nativity, occupation, and marital status. The multilevel model makes it possible to control for these predictors and to study independent sources of variation in segregation across cities. There is considerable variation at the city level, especially due to differences in the relative sizes of groups. Other significant city-level predictors of people’s neighborhood composition include the share of group members who are foreign-born, the disparity in occupational standing between group members and native whites, and the degree of occupational segregation between them.     

当前民族意识对民族地区和谐社会建设的影响

民族意识作为各民族维护自身民族权益或利益的一种反映和认识,是民族地区影响民族关系及社会和谐建设的重要因素。在新的社会历史发展时期,各民族的民族平等意识、发展意识和对传统民族文化的认同意识都有不同程度的增强,并对民族地区的经济社会发展和民族关系产生了重要的影响。