Book notes

The Social Mind: Language, Ideology and Social Practice By James Paul Gee. New York: Bergin & Garvey, 1992. 175 pages. $14.95 (paper).

The Afterlife of the Life History. A special issue of the Journal of Narrative and Life History, 2(1). M. Blackman (Ed.), Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1992. 79 pages, $17.50.

Teaching Thinking: An Agenda for the 21st Century. C. Collins & J. N. Mangieri (Eds.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1992. 362 pages, $69.95; $34.50 (paper).     

Value of Statistical Life and Cause of Accident: A Choice Experiment

The purpose of this study is to compare the value of statistical life (VSL) estimates for traffic, drowning, and fire accidents. Using a choice experiment in a mail survey of 5,000 Swedish respondents we estimated the willingness to pay for risk reductions in the three accidents. In the experiment respondents were asked a series of questions, whether they would choose risk reducing investments where type of accident, cost of the investment, the risk reduction acquired, and the baseline risk varied between questions. The VSLs for fire and drowning accidents were found to be about 1/3 lower than that for traffic accidents. Although respondents worry more about traffic accidents, this alone cannot explain the difference in VSL estimates. The difference between fire and drowning accidents was not found to be statistically significant.     

On the scaling of annoyance due to environmental factors

A recurrent problem in sociological annoyance surveys is to scale the environmental variables quantitatively as they are perceived. Data from two surveys on malodors and noise are discussed within a framework of scaling theory. A Thurstonian scaling technique was applied to the category annoyance data. In the investigation of malodors a rather stable picture of the results of the annoyance reports was obtained independently of the assumptions made in data treatment. On the other hand, the results of the noise investigation indicate that paired comparisons may furnish a better procedure than verbal category scaling for data collection in surveys. Scales of annoyance from different populations will give different units of measurement, and annoyance scales cannot be compared adequately unless the scales are calibrated. A possible calibration procedure is to introduce a defined psychological unit of measurement into the data.This study was supported by grants from the Swedish Environment Protection Board and the Swedish Council for Social Science Research. The authors wish to thank Anita and Peter Medlund for collecting parts of the data.     

Self-Other Agreement in Happiness and Life-Satisfaction: The Role of Personality Traits

The aim of the current study is to examine the role of personality traits in self-other agreement in happiness and life-satisfaction which are often seen as the essential components of subjective well-being (SWB). Self-reports on the SWB measure and the NEO Personality Inventory-3 were obtained from 1,251 Estonians aged between 18 and 86 years. Other-ratings on the same measures were provided by knowledgeable informants. The measure of SWB showed significant self-other agreement, r = .55 (p = .000). We found this agreement to be transmitted (i.e., mediated) through the self- and other-rated personality facet scores of N3 (Depression) and E6 (Positive Emotions), Z = 2.8001–11.7142. The findings suggest that when an informant evaluates someone’s happiness or life-satisfaction, his/her rating is inflated by the image held about the personality of this person. Furthermore, self-reported SWB reflects, to some extent, what other people think about one’s personality.     

Las Migraciones en el Proceso de Integracion de las Americas: Seminario Internacional (Migration in the Integration Process in the Americas: International Seminar). Conference report

This conference report of the Centro de Estudios Migratorios Latinoamericanos and the Center for Migration Studies pertains to meetings held in August 1992. Summary information on migration movements in Latin America is presented by region and subject. The topic of integration in the Americas was presented by Mr. Lelio Marmora. Other topics and presenters include the new Colombian Migration Policy (Mr. Carlos Adolfo Arenas), the integration policies in Central America (Mr. Pilar Norza of Costa Rica, Raimundo Alvarado of El Salvador, and Luis Armando Gusman of Nicaragua), the Andean Pact agreements (representatives of each country), US immigration policy (Charles B. Keely), the Mexican integration with Latin America and immigration to the US (Jorge Bustamante), migration to Bolivia and Argentina and Chile, and transnationalism in the Caribbean (Professor Andre Corten). Migration policy needs to be tailored specifically to the situation in Latin America, and greater attention needs to be devoted to labor migrants' rights and working conditions. There are still fundamental differences among countries in policies regarding the free circulation of persons across borders. There is a division among those who support migration and those who are realists. National sovereignty issues are solvable because of a common national past and a relatively homogenous population. Another opinion is that Latin America is more diverse than commonly recognized. Capital is protected more in international agreements than is migrant labor. Regional integration for the US does mean immigration from Mexico. The US sees Mexican migration as a policy problem, and Mexico sees migration as a labor opportunity.     

Do administrators have the same priorities for risk reductions as the general public?

A stated preference survey was used to investigate the potential discrepancy between the priorities of public administrators and the general public regarding risk reductions. Both groups of respondents were asked to assume the role of a public policy-maker and choose between different public safety projects. We investigate differences in three areas: (i) large vs. small accidents, (ii) actual vs. subjective risk, and (iii) the trade-off between avoiding fatalities and serious injuries for different age groups and accidents. We find only minor differences between the responses of administrators and the general public, the most important of which is the difference in priorities between reducing the risk of many small or one large accident. In this area the most common response from the general public is that they prefer avoiding many small accidents rather than one large accident while among the administrators there is almost an equal split between the two options.     

Accounting for Genocide: How Many Were Killed in Srebrenica?

The takeover of the UN safearea of Srebrenica by Bosnian Serb forces inJuly 1995 was followed by the killing of alarge number of male Bosnian Muslim civilians,in what has been characterized as the worstmassacre in Europe since World War II. Thisarticle is based on a report submitted asevidence to the UN International CriminalTribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) inthe case against General Radislav Krsti,who became the first person to be convicted ofgenocide at this Tribunal. This case also formspart of the genocide charges against SlobodanMiloevi, Radovan Karadi and RatkoMladi. To our knowledge, this report isunique among genocide studies in its approach,using individual-level data to identify everyvictim in order to arrive at a highly reliableminimum estimate of the number of peoplekilled. This was possible because of efforts byhumanitarian organizations to register peoplewho disappeared during the war as well as theavailability of both pre- and post-conflictdata on individuals. We conclude that at least7,475 persons were killed after the fall ofSrebrenica. We also present estimates of theprobability of being a victim: more than 33%for Muslim men who were enumerated inSrebrenica in 1991.     

Short-term and long-term effects of an outpatient rehabilitation program for patients with musculoskeletal disorders

The objective of the study was to investigate whether intensified rehabilitation efforts in primary health care may produce any short-term or long-term reduction of sick leave. The resources at the health care center were fortified with a coordinator from the local insurance office and a specialist group from the hospital. In one primary health care district, a prospective study was performed among 100 patients with a musculoskeletal disorder, having caused at least 21 consecutive days of full-time sick leave (patients). Serving as a control group were individually matched patients from any other health care center in the surrounding municipality of Kristianstad (controls). The number of sick leave days was assessed during year one (short-term) and year three (long-term) after rehabilitation was initiated. The median number of days with sickness benefits for men in the short-term was lower for patients than for controls (34.5 vs 48.5). No difference was found among women. No differences were found in the long-term between patients and controls, either for men or women. We conclude that rehabilitation in primary health care was made more efficient through collaboration with the local insurance office and the specialists, but the effects were not maintained after the collaboration ended.