Evaluating the oversight of scientific misconduct

The Office of Research Integrity has proposed a new definition of scientific misconduct that will substantively reduce the federal government's role of oversight of scientific practices. The standard is being changed despite the lack of evidence about the effects of current policies or understanding of why research misconduct occurs, how it can be detected and prevented, and the nature and effectiveness of sanctions. Given this lack of knowledge and the perception that the integrity of science is falling, we believe it would be unwise for the academic and scientific community to adopt this new standard.     

Evaluating Stimulus-Stimulus Pairing and Direct Reinforcement in the Establishment of an Echoic Repertoire of Children Diagnosed with Autism

Many children with autism do not imitate adult vocalizations, an important skill in learning to talk. Pairing adult vocalizations with preferred stimuli has been shown to increase free-operant vocalizations but effects are temporary; thus, direct reinforcement may be necessary to establish durable vocal behaviors. In Experiment 1, directly reinforced echoic responses did not increase following stimulus-stimulus pairings in three children with autism. Similarly, pairings did not increase free-operant vocalizations in Experiment 2, a replication of Miguel et al. (2002). Experiment 3 demonstrated that shaping increased vowel frequency for one participant. Results suggest that variables are yet to be delineated that influence effectiveness of a stimulus-stimulus pairing procedure on vocalization frequency and acquisition of a verbal operant following such pairings.     

Exercise intervention designed to improve strength and dynamic balance among community-dwelling older adults

Loss of balance and falling are critical concerns for older adults. Physical activity can improve balance and decrease the risk of falling. The purpose of this study was to evaluate a simple, low-cost exercise program for community-dwelling older adults. Sixteen senior adults were evaluated using the Senior Fitness Test for measures of functional strength, aerobic endurance, dynamic balance and agility, and flexibility. In addition, measures of height, weight, resting blood pressure, blood lipids, and cognitive function were obtained. Participants then attended a 10-week exercise class including stretching, strengthening, and balance-training exercises. At the completion of the program, significant improvements were observed in tests measuring dynamic balance and agility, lower and upper extremity strength, and upper extremity flexibility. The results indicate that exercise programs such as this are an effective, low-cost solution to improving health and factors that affect falling risk among older adults.     

Violence against women with physical disabilities

This study explored risk factors for violence among a sample of adult women with physical disabilities. Fifty-six percent (100) of the 177 women participating in the study indicated a positive history of abuse. Of the women who reported abuse, most reported multiple abuse situations and abusers who were typically their male partners. In addition, only a small proportion of women sought and received adequate help. Women who indicated that they did not seek help were asked why this was the case. Their responses included: feeling that they could handle it themselves, having other sources of support available, being unaware of where to go, feeling embarrassed, feeling guilty about being a burden or that it was their fault, fear that abuser would come after them, fear of not being believed, and, to a lesser extent, concern that the shelter would lack appropriate accommodations. These findings highlight the importance of intervention strategies including advocacy activities for women with disabilities, activities with schools, activities to deter and prevent partner and caregiver violence, community awareness activities, and dissemination activities.     

Weighing Health Benefit and Health Risk Information when Consuming Sport-Caught Fish

Fish consumers may incur benefits and risks from eating fish. Health advisories issued by states, tribes, and other entities typically include advice about how to limit fish consumption or change other behaviors (e.g., fish cleaning or cooking) to reduce health risks from exposure to contaminants. Eating fish, however, may provide health benefits. Risk communicators and fish consumers have suggested the importance of including risk comparison information, as well as health risk-benefit comparisons in health advisory communications. To improve understanding about how anglers fishing in waters affected by health advisories may respond to such risk-risk or risk-benefit information, we surveyed Lake Ontario (NY, USA) anglers. We interviewed by telephone 4,750 anglers, 2,593 of which had fished Lake Ontario in the past 12 months and were sent a detailed mail questionnaire (1,245 responded). We posed questions varying the magnitude of health risks and health benefits to be gained by fish consumption, and varied the population affected by these risks and benefits (anglers, children, women of childbearing age, and unborn children). Respondents were influenced by health benefit and health risk information. When risks were high, most respondents would eat less fish regardless of the benefit level. When risks were low, the magnitude of change in fish consumption was related to level of benefit. Responses differed depending on the question wording order, that is, whether "risks" were posed before "benefits." For a given risk-benefit level, respondents would give different advice to women of childbearing age versus children, with more conservative advice (eat less fish) provided to women of childbearing age. Respondents appeared to be influenced more strongly by risk-risk comparisons (e.g., risks from other foods vs. risks from fish) than by risk-benefit comparisons (e.g., risks from fish vs. benefits from fish). Risk analysts and risk communicators should improve efforts to include risk-risk and risk-benefit comparisons in communication efforts, and to clarify to whom the health risks and benefits from fish consumption may accrue.     

Mixed marriages. Some key questions

The author discusses various aspects of intercultural or mixed marriage. Factors considered include trends in different countries; determinants of mixed marriage; cultural and social class differences; and mate selection. (SUMMARY IN FRE AND SPA)     

Religious intermarriage in Switzerland, 1969–72 and 1979–82

Patterns of marriage between Protestants and Roman Catholics in Switzerland during 1969–72 and 1979–82 are investigated using magnitudes of marriage attraction, measures that reflect the propensity to marry independent of population composition. The results show high levels of intermarriage, with religious differences becoming less salient in marriage choice. There is no evidence that the propensity to intermarry is influenced by minority group effects.Les modalités de mariage entre protestants et catholiques romains en Suisse sont analysées à l'aide d'une mesure de l'importance de l'attraction matrimoniale, qui reflète la propensité au mariage éliminant l'effet de la composition de la population. Les résultats montrent des niveaux élevés de mariages mixtes, tandis que les différences deviennent moins importantes dans les choix matrimoniaux. Il n'est pas évident que la propensité au mariage mixte soit influencée par des effets dus au fait que certains groupes soient minoritaires.     

Biography as historical sociology

Conclusion William Fielding Ogburn was located on and helped to create the cutting edge of developments in twentieth-century American sociology — particularly its increasing emphasis on statistics and objectivist methodology. His life, which spanned the period within which the changes he advocated were institutionalized, can be seen as having significance as a marker of a transition. From this perspective, studying well-chosen individual lives has the same heuristic value as studying particular historical events. They can, to quote Philip Abrams, mark decisive conjunctions of action and structure;... moments of structuring at which human agency encounters social possibility and can be seen most clearly as simultaneously determined and determining. My analysis of Ogburn's advocacy of scientific sociology — one that differentiated science from both emotion and politics — reflected and reinforced his solutions to problematics in his personal life. His response to the separate spheres that defined gender relations in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century America, helped to construct a reflection of them in twentieth-century American sociology. It is in this way — through concrete social action within specific historical conditions — that personal life and gender shaped the intellectual and professional culture within which he lived and worked.Ogburn's life story suggests that action, particularly advocacy, is grounded, at least in part, in a personal agenda, but that personal agendas, just like any others, need to be understood sociologically. Ogburn's problem was not idiosyncratic. Indeed, it is because it was shaped by social conditions, rather than uniquely individual ones, that his solutions were more likely to be recognized, accepted, and institutionalized by his mostly male audiences. Tracing these connections within a concrete historical case, within a single biography, demonstrates how personal life is connected to action and, thus, needs to be included in any sociological theory of human agency.Ogburn's life coincided with a set of opportunities that made it possible for sociologists to gain a more prominent place in national affairs and to develop sociological knowledge in a particular direction. This development was, in turn, accompanied by the creation of a language and practice in which the scientific authority of sociology became associated with it being devoid of an appearance of politics and emotion. The emergence of this language and practice, and the beliefs on which they were based, however, cannot be explained solely by the circumstances that fostered them or the career opportunities that they made available. They reflect the practical actions of human agents within historically specific settings. But these agents must be recognized as gendered and the problematic of gendering must be incorporated into the history of American sociology.As Steinmetz has argued, the stories that we tell are important for what we do — and what we do not do — because they structure social consciousness and social action. As long as we write the history of American sociology as an ungendered narrative, we will not only misrepresent that history but we will also limit our capacity to understand and affect changes in it. Differentiation was (and is) a strategy more available to men than women and the norms and organization of professional life that embody that strategy need to be understood not as general but rather as gendered.There is a gender dimension to the history of American sociology to which more attention could usefully be given. Although the impact of political and professional interests has been widely recognized in this history, the impact of personal life in general and gender relations in particular have not been systematically incorporated into accounts of this process. Yet gender relations — and the meanings and actions that are shaped by them — are an important part of the story being told here and an important source of the energy that institutionalizing social change entails. Biography provides access to these personal and gendered dimensions of our professional history in ways that can more adequately acknowledge the complexities of the structuring process.

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The (mis)acquisition of gender identity among transsexuals

Transsexualism suggests questions for sociologists who study gender. Is gender identity always a precursor to role behavior or might it result from the social reactions to deviant behavior? This article considers several theoretical explanations for the (mis)acquisition of gender identity among transsexuals: biological hypotheses, psychoanalytic theories, social learning, and role theory. The author concludes that gender role and gender identity are confounded in past research and that the issue inflexibility of identities needs to be treated more systematically.