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.     

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.     

“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.     

Multiple-Scale Integrated Assessments of Societal Metabolism: Integrating Biophysical and Economic Representations Across Scales

The crucial challenge for integrated analyses of socioeconomic systems is keeping coherence in their multidimensional representation. Our approach describes the hierarchical structure of socioeconomic systems using the profile of allocation of human activity over a set of compartments defined at different hierarchical levels (e.g., whole countries, economic sectors, individual households). Compartments are characterized in terms of intensive variables (intensity of both exosomatic energy flows and added value flows per unit of human activity) and the extensive variable Total Human Activity population. In this way, relations of congruence across hierarchical levels can be used to link non-equivalent analyses. That is, changes in demographic variables, economic variables, technical coefficients, indices of environmental loading, institutional settings, and social aspirations are no longer independent of each-other even if described within different scientific disciplines.     

The utility of happiness

The issue. Nineteenth century utilitarian philosophers considered happiness as the highest good (utility in their words) and claimed political priority for attempts to promote the greatest happiness for the greatest number. In reaction, many of their contemporaries cried out that happiness is not good at all, because it turns people into contented cows and undermines social bonds. Modern psychologists, however, tend to suggest positive effects: sharper awareness, more activity, better social functioning and better health. Data. No empirical investigations have yet focussed on consequences of happiness. Nevertheless, indications can be found in various studies covering other matters. This paper gathers the available data. These data do not allow definite conclusions, but do suggest several small yet noteworthy effects. Enjoyment of life seems to broaden perception, to encourage active involvement and thereby to foster political participation. It facilitates social contacts: in particular contacts with spouse and children. Further, happiness buffers stress, thereby preserving health and lengthening life somewhat. There is no evidence of harmful effects. It is concluded that society is more likely to flourish with happy citizens than with unhappy ones.     

Reflections on sustainability,population growth,and the environment

The related terms, sustainable and sustainability, have become popular and are used to describe a wide variety of activities which are generally ecologically laudable. At the same time, the term compromise is heard more frequently because the needs of the environment often are in conflict with the needs of humans. A brief examination of the question of compromise shows that a series of ten compromises, each of which saves 70% of the remaining environment, results in the saving of only 3% of the environment. Judging from the ways in which the terms sustainable and sustainability are used, their definitions are not very precise, especially when compromises are involved. An attempt is made here to give firm definition to these terms and to translate the definition into a series of laws and hypotheses which, it is hoped, will clarify the implications of their use. These are followed by a series of observations and predictions that relate to sustainability.     

Multiple-Scale Integrated Analysis of Farming Systems: The Thuong Lo Commune (Vietnamese Uplands) Case Study

This paper presents an application of an innovative methodological tool for the integrated assessment of farming systems (Multi-Objective Multiple-Scale Integrated Representation). It describes the effect of rural development in parallel on economic and ecological reading at different levels: household, village, and the commune comprising 3 villages. Socio-economic and environmental indicators are organized into integrated packages across scales. This is an ex-post facto analysis of a program of rural development implemented in the Central Vietnamese uplands in 1995 by the central government with the collaboration of FAO. We conclude that two classic problems can only be faced by using an integrated analysis across levels: Large scale generalizations can miss important location-specific characteristics, and exclusive focus on location specific issues carries the risk of loosing the big picture.     

Factors Affecting Birth Rates among White Women 20–24 Years of Age: A Trend Analysis (January 1972–march 1992)

Using Current Population Survey data, Vital and Health Statistics data, photoperiod data and temperature data, this article attempts to provide an interdisciplinary explanation of monthly (N = 243) variation in the dependent variable representing the birth rate (the rate of conceptions that become live births) for white women 20–24 years of age. Among the selected explanatory variables, four were found to play significant roles in accounting for the variation of the birth rate. They were rates of female absence from the labor market (nonparticipation plus unemployment), male employment rates, length-of-night variations and the days in the month of conception. Rainwater's concept of validating activities (1974) and recent quality of life research regarding domains serve as a basis for development of the concepts compensatory validation and contextual compatibility. Research and policy implications are discussed.     

Government fragmentation and suburban services: The equality of consumer choice

The predominant reform tradition of centralizing suburban government to deal with problems of inequality in the distribution of local services has been attacked recently by a new school of thought often labelled New Political Economists. This school believes that the existing structure of local government can maximize citizen choice by allowing citizens to shop around between the level and mix of public goods and services offered by alternate communities. The term polycentricity has been coined to describe this situation. Critics of polycentricity believe that the resulting quasi-market would be unfair to low and moderate income suburbanites. This paper examines the actual extent of choice in service levels available to different income groups located in the suburban ring of six metropolitan areas. The extent of inequality in choice between different income groups is measured and the implications of these findings for the conflict between polycentric and centralizing reformers is discussed.The research reported in this paper was funded by the National Science Foundation, Grant Number SOC7705600     

Earth,the Business of the Future: From Ego Energy to Eco Energy

Just as we have a turn around manager to save a failing business organization, so it is held, we need a turn around perspective to retrieve the Earth from being in a deficit position. Hence the paradoxical emphasis upon the Earth as the business of the future. Two important distinctions are offered which together provide a new frame of reference for bonding the human and the Earth. The initiating event for the first distinction was a business conference whose purpose was to explore the emerging domain of ego energy. In a parallel way, it is proposed we explore the yet to be discovered domain of eco energy. With eco energy we open our narrowed human window to cosmic perception. With cosmic perception, the energy of the universe can flow through us. The second distinction is between looking at and seeing. Looking at refers to treating our world as a collection of objects. As a collection of objects the Earth can be processed as a series of business transactions. With seeing we relate to our world as a communion of subjects. Such seeing offers transforming power for the human and the Earth to engage in the dialogue of powerful listening and speaking on both individual and planetary scale. These two sets of distinctions are sounded like echo chambers against ten ecologically guiding statements. These ten guiding statements become a reality-testing, experiential framework. Such a turn around perspective offers a different vision to be operationalized in our individual, community, and business lives. Then we can see clearly and respond with eco energy to the Earth, the business of the future!     

Arts and the quality of life: an Exploratory study

The aim of this investigation was to measure the impact of the arts broadly construed on the quality of life. A randomly drawn household sample of 315 adult residents of Prince George, British Columbia served as the working data-set. Examining zero-order correlations, among other things, it was found that playing a musical instrument a number of times per year was positively associated with general health (r = 0.37), while singing alone a number of hours per week was negatively associated with general health (r = –0.19). The strongest positive associations with life satisfaction are satisfaction obtained from gourmet cooking and embroidery, needlepoint or cross-stitching, at r = 0.39 andr = 0.32, respectively. The satisfaction obtained from gourmet cooking (r = 0.35) and buying works of art (r = 0.32) were the most positive influences on happiness. The strongest associations with the Index of Subjective Well-Being are the satisfaction obtained from gourmet cooking (r = 0.37) and the satisfaction obtained from knitting or crocheting (r = 0.34). Examining multivariate relations, it was found that eight predictors combined to explain 59% of the variance in life satisfaction scores, with self-esteem satisfaction ( = 0.35) and friendship satisfaction ( = 0.27) most influential. Among the arts-related predictors in the eight, singing alone was fairly influential and negative ( = –0.18), while the satisfaction obtained from reading to others (=0.08) and the Index of Arts as Self-Health Enhancers ( = 0.11) were somewhat less influential. When the arts-related predictors were combined with a set of domain satisfaction predictors, total explanatory power was increased by only 3 percentage points. Seven predictors could explain 58% of the variance in satisfaction with the overall quality of life scores. Of the arts-related predictors, only time spent going to non-art museums was significant ( = 0.07). Arts-related predictors did not increase explanatory power at all beyond that obtained from domain satisfaction variables alone. Eight predictors explained 42% of the variance in happiness scores, with the most influential predictors including satisfaction with self-esteem ( = 0.37) and financial security ( = 0.21), followed by the Index of Arts as Self-Developing Activities ( = 0.18). Arts-related predictors added 3 percentage points of explanatory power to that obtained from domain satisfaction scores. Seven predictors could explain 65% of the variance in scores on the Index of Subjective Well-Being, led by self-esteem satisfaction ( = 0.35) and financial security satisfaction ( = 0.30). The Index of Arts as Community Builders had a modest influence ( = 0.11), but all together, arts-related predictors increased our total explanatory power by a single percentage point. Summarizing these multivariate results, it seems fair to say that, relative to the satisfaction obtained from other domains of life, the arts had a very small impact on the quality of life (measured in four somewhat different ways) of a sample of residents of Prince George who generally cared about the arts. Even in absolute terms, arts-related activities could only explain from 5% to 11% of the variance in four plausible measures of the self-perceived quality of respondents lives. By comparing the composition of our sample with census data from 2001, it was demonstrated that the sample was not representative of residents of our city. It would, therefore, be wrong to generalize our findings to the whole population of Prince George or to any larger population.     

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.     

Is happiness a trait?

One of the ideological foundations of the modern welfare states is the belief that people can be made happier by providing them with better living conditions. This belief is challenged by the theory that happiness is a fixed trait, rather than a variable state. This theory figures both at the individual level and at the societal level. The individual level variant depicts happiness as an aspect of personal character; rooted in inborn temperament or acquired disposition. The societal variant sees happiness as a matter of national character; embedded in shared values and beliefs. Both variants imply that a better society makes no happier people.Happiness can be regarded as a trait if it meets three criteria: (1) temporal stability, (2) cross-situational consistency, and (3) inner causation. This paper checks whether that is, indeed, the case.     

Migrant stock vs. lagged migrant flow as a determinant of migrant settlement. A comment on Anjomani and Hariri

In a recent contribution to this Journal Anjomani and Hariri present an interesting study of United States interstate migration which explicitly incorporates so-called flow diversion and flow creation effects. Their discussion and evaluation of the model, however, are marred by several factors. This paper contrasts the roles of migrant stock and lagged migration in migration analysis and then addresses (a) the problems encountered when the family-friends effect is proxied with measures of lagged migrant flows, (b) the problem of using a two-period lagged value of earlier migrant flow as an explanatory variable, and (c) this paper suggests an alternative method of correcting the Anjomani-Hariri model's problems with multicollinearity.The author is grateful to Walter J. Wadycki and to David A. Macpherson for helpful comments and suggestions. The author, of course, bears full responsibility for all errors that remain. This research benefited from a grant from the Miami University Committee on Faculty Research.     

Macro-effects of changes in household preferences for children

The basic ideas underlying the analysis in this paper are that family size can be viewed as an economic life cycle decision and that there are decision trade-offs among fertility, consumption, and leisure. A micromodel of life cycle choice is developed and embedded in an economic-demographic macromodel. The macromodel is then used in a series of computer experiments to assess the effects on the population and the economy of changes in household preferences for children. The experiments include factual and counterfactual simulations of Canadian historical demographic experience and simulations of alternative future scenarios. The analysis and conclusions have general relevance for countries that have been through a fertility boom-and-bust sequence.We are grateful for the support received from Health and Welfare Canada's Review of Demography and Its Implications for Social and Economic Policy and from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. We are grateful also to Christine H. Feaver, who carried out the computer-related aspects of the work on which this paper is based.     

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.     

Households and Territory. The Location of the Population of Rome in Relation to Housing Supply Characteristics

This study forms part of a general programme of research aimed at evaluating the quality of life in Rome. In particular, we have wished to analyse the way in which housing quality, measured with indicators of housing structure and utilization, intersects with the quality of urban livability, measured here only with indicators of social background, homogeneity and hardship referring to subjects living in the individual segments of the city. Groups of territorial areas, homogeneous by housing typology, were identified using multivariate data analysis and it was thus shown how particular typologies of household respond to this supply. From this emerged a particular model of development of the city in concentric bands, within which the originally differentiated households have tended over time to assume homogeneous characteristics.     

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.     

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.     

The welfare effects of labour force growth with internationally mobile capital

The effects of labour supply growth on the welfare of preexisting destination and non-emigrating source populations are analysed. This growth occurs in open economies where free trade in capital goods is possible. Traditional small economy arguments for population growth rely on the existence of priced though internationally immobile factors. When all factors are freely-traded and population grows naturally the case rests either on market distortions or common property within families. In an integrated world labour growth can lead to capital flight and increasing wage differentials. With international interactions, immigration increases preexisting welfare in destination countries but generally (not always) reduces it for non-emigrants in source countries. Immigration provides efficiency gains to all originally resident in source countries. Natural population growth anywhere promotes efficiency gains everywhere.