CAN EARLY FAMILY FORMATION EXPLAIN THE LOWER EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT OF U.S. CONSERVATIVE PROTESTANTS?

Using nationally representative data, this article assesses whether the timing of life course transitions (i.e., marriage and childbirth) can explain the lower educational attainment of individuals raised in conservative Protestant (CP) households. A key finding is that early family formation affects educational attainment for both white and black women raised in CP households. For white women, the timing of family formation, net of controls, reduces the negative effect of childhood CP to insignificance. For black women, the timing of family formation reduces but does not eliminate the negative effect. For black men and white men, the negative effect of childhood CP on adult educational attainment is explained away by control variables.     

RISK SOCIETY,MEDIA, AND POWER: THE CASE OF NANOTECHNOLOGY

Risk society theory posits that the transformation of industrial to postindustrial society corresponded with a transformation of societal power structured by capital, to one structured by the ability to define risk. Perceptions of risk are, in part, socially constructed and created through the framing efforts of various institutional actors. The resulting struggle over meaning is particularly acute when the issues contain many unknown elements—as is the case with emerging technologies. Applying insights from media studies, frame analysis, and organizational theory, we analyze coverage of nanotechnology (NT) in popular press, trade, and general science publications. The findings document the extent to which the risks of this emerging technology are presented or ignored across, between, and within organizational subfields. The analysis empirically assesses a key proposition of risk society theory and reveals how institutional processes reflect and reproduce power differentials. We discuss the implications of the empirical findings for sociological theories of risk and society, power, and collective action.     

Rape Protests in India and the Birth of a New Repertoire

The gang rape of a young physiotherapy student on a moving bus in December of 2012, in Delhi, India, brought forward a series of countrywide protests. These protests were unique compared with prior protests in India, leading to a need to re-examine the political importance of social movements in the subcontinent. Using data from 748 newspaper reports on the demonstrations that took place from December 2012 to April 2013, this paper examines the unique characteristics of the rape protests and their implications on the birth of a new repertoire in social movements. For the first time in Indian history, women's rights and violence against women occupied the forefront of national politics, and was no longer limited to agendas of feminists and women's groups. The protests were not led by a specific interest group, but were spontaneous and horizontal in nature, with participants from various social and political backgrounds. This paper argues that with the help of technology and new social media that a new repertoire of protests emerged: a horizontal, spontaneous, mass movement across interest groups.     

The carpetbaggers revisited: New perspectives on interregional migration after the American Civil War

Those Terrible Carpetbaggers: A Reinterpretation. Richard Nelson Current. New York: Oxford University Press. 1988. 475pp. $24.95.

Carpetbagger from Vermont: The Autobiography of Marshall Harvey Twitchell. Edited by Ted Tunnell. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. 1989. 216pp. £23.95.

The Confederate Carpetbaggers. Daniel E. Sutherland. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. 1988. 360pp. £13.55.     

Centralized and non-centralized ethics review: a five nation study

The research ethics review process is now an inherent part of conducting research and a topic of much discussion. On the negative side it has been presented as cumbersome, expensive, time consuming, and potentially a system that does not adequately deal with the concerns it was set up to address. One common, but often controversial, proposal to address some of these concerns has been the institutionalization of centralized systems of review. This paper uses data on the review systems in place in five countries (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the USA and the U.K.), some with and some without versions of centralized review, to explore issues related to centralization of the review process. It suggests that there are at least three types of systems (fully centralized, dual, and decentralized or multicommittee) in place; all are made up of two, interrelated components (the administrative and ethics review). We suggest that both components need to be considered in discussions about centralized review. Serious consideration of centralization of the administrative component may address many concerns. Centralization of the ethics review may provide a context that deals with other issues and may encourage reviews that more effectively focus on the ethical issues involved.     

Properties of two tests for outliers in multivariate data

Mardia's multivariate kurtosis and the generalized distance have desirable properties as multivariate outlier tests. However, extensive critical values have not been published heretofore. A published approximation formula for critical values of the kurtosis is shown to inadequately control the type I error rate, with observed error rates often differing from their intended values by a factor of two or more. Critical values derived from simulations for both tests for up to 25 dimensions and 500 observations are presented. The power curves of both tests are discussed. The generalized distance is the more powerful test when exactly one outlier is present and the contaminant is substantially mean-shifted. However, as the number of outliers increases, the kurtosis becomes the more powerful test. The two tests are compared with respect to power and vulnerability to masking. Recommendations for the use of these tests and interpretation of results are given.     

No going back: A review of the literature on sustaining organizational change

Why do some organizational changes persist, while others decay? The sustainability of change can be defined broadly as the process through which new working methods, performance goals and improvement trajectories are maintained for a period appropriate to a given context. However, sustainability has received limited attention, although the concept reflects Lewin's concern with ‘refreezing’ ( Lewin. K. 1951 . Field Theory in Social Science: Selected Theoretical Papers by Kurt Lewin, UK edition published 1952, ed. D. Cartwright, London: Tavistock). In an uncertain environment, working practices that fail to adapt are targets for change, and stability has been regarded not as a condition to be achieved, but as a symptom of inertia, a problem to be solved. This paper reviews the emerging literature, seeking to develop a provisional model of the processes influencing change sustainability and decay, as a platform for further research. This review suggests that sustainability is dependent on multiple factors, at different levels of analysis: substantial, individual, managerial, financial, leadership, organizational, cultural, political, processual, contextual and temporal. The relative significance of those factors cannot be determined a priori, raising questions concerning the properties of the sustainability process with regard to different types of change in different contexts.     

Social Engagement and Immigration Attitudes: Panel Survey Evidence from Germany

This article asks how social engagement influences individuals' immigration concerns. Rates of volunteering, churchgoing, socializing, and helping others are used to predict anti‐immigration sentiments. Panel survey data from Germany makes a dynamic “conditional change” modeling strategy possible; lagged immigration views are included in models to reveal the predictors of over time developments. The most robust findings signal that frequent church attendance reduces immigration concerns; routinely helping others enhances them. And in both instances, these relationships are conditioned by the presence of immigrants in the residential area. Overall, the results position social participation in certain activities as important factors that shape people's views on immigration.