More Deaths Than Births: Subnational Natural Decrease in Europe and the United States

This article examines the prevalence and dynamics of natural decrease in the subnational populations of Europe and the United States. Natural decrease results from interactions between fertility, mortality, and migration over a protracted period. We document the greater incidence and degree of natural decrease in Europe. In the first decade of the twenty‐first century, natural decrease occurred in 58 percent of European NUTS 3 areas (“counties”) compared to only 28 percent of the US counties. Three critical demographic variables (proportion over 65, child‐women ratio, and proportion of women of childbearing age) each exert a significant and distinct impact on the likelihood of natural decrease. Our spatial regression models reflect remarkable consistency in the influence of each of these variables in Europe and in the US, demonstrating the similarity in the demographic processes that produce natural decrease.     

From bias to coverage: What explains how news organizations treat social movements

Why do newspapers cover social movement actors, and why is this coverage sometimes favorable? Early scholarship saw the news media mainly as a source of data on collective action, and sought to ascertain its biases, but scholarship has increasingly focused directly on why movements gain coverage, especially coverage that can advance their goals. To understand why and how newspapers cover movement actors, we start with the insight that movements rely on the news media for many reasons, but their coverage is largely in the control of news institutions. In this review, we focus on perspectives that specify 3‐way interactions between the characteristics of newspapers, social movement actors, and the social and political contexts, but we begin with how news media institutions are organized. We conclude with suggestions for future research that take advantage of the digital revolution of the last generation.     

Connecting the Characteristics of International Volunteer Experiences with Their Impacts: A Canadian Case Study

The direct relationship between international volunteer experiences and impacts has rarely been explored and yet is important for understanding why certain impacts occur in the lives of volunteers upon returning home. This information helps organizations to develop effective international volunteer programs. This interpretive case study of the Nova Scotia-Gambia Association’s volunteer program explores the interactions between motivations, experiences, and impacts of volunteers who participate in short-term, development aid projects. It utilizes qualitative interviews and participant observation with recent volunteers and interviews with past alumni to understand these relationships. The findings identify three distinct types of volunteer narratives connecting experiences and impacts—personal, professional, and negative categories. The key characteristics of the experience are living situations and conditions, location selection, work placement options, and non-work related activities, frame experiences and effect impacts, influencing the nature of the narrative. Narratives are also strongly influenced by volunteer personalities and characteristics of the local culture.     

Aboriginal fertility: Trends and prospects

Estimates of Aboriginal fertility compiled from an analysis of 1981 and 1986 Census data on children ever borne by Aboriginal women reveal age-specific fertility rates slightly higher than those of other Australian women at ages above 25, but very much higher rates for younger women. The result is a total fertility ratio more than 50 per cent higher than in the total Australian population, with no more than slight variation between States and Territories. A differential analysis using standardized indices shows considerable differences in levels of fertility of categories of young Aboriginal women classified by education, labour force status and income, and also differences between urban and rural areas. Analysis of prospects for Aboriginal fertility levels confirms the likelihood of continuation in the downward drift in levels of fertility that has been established during the past decade. Comparison of the estimates with another recent set of estimates obtained using the own-children method shows broad conformity in levels of total fertility ratios over time, except in the most recent period, the mid-1980s. Nevertheless, the own-children estimates distort the recent trend and also the age distribution of Aboriginal fertility.     

A distribution function estimator for the difference of order statistics from two independent samples

For two independent populations X and Y we develop the empirical distribution function estimator for the difference of order statistics of the form X _(i)−Y _(j). The key practical application for this estimator pertains to inference between quantiles from two independent populations.     

Responses to Scarcity

Studies of pre-industrial societies suggest that in response to protracted scarcity, individuals experience a decline in social relations, return to traditional practices and values, and become more subordinate to those in authority. In this paper, we examine the extent to which these same responses are found in an industrialized area. Evidence from survey data suggests that scarcity and economic decline do decrease social relations and cause some individuals (those with less formal education) to use more traditional means to solve problems, but they do not cause people to become more passive in respect to community leaders. Factors that may account for the different responses to scarcity in industrial and pre-industrial societies are discussed.     

Life satisfaction among the rural elderly: What do the numbers mean?

Studies of life satisfaction among the elderly are based almost entirely on quantitative data, yet we have little knowledge of whether such data are consistent and valid representations of satisfaction. The present paper addresses this issue through a comparison of quantitative and qualitative data on satisfaction with housing, family, spouse, self-esteem, health, friends and life as a whole. The data were obtained from 15 elderly men and women living in rural Ontario who had participated in both a survey study of life satisfaction and an intensive qualitative study of loneliness, social activities and social relationships. The values selected by participants from scales of satisfaction were found to be fairly similar overall to judgements made by the investigators on the basis of qualitative data from interviews and diaries. But there were also a number of discrepancies across both participants and domains, and these discrepancies were not systematic. The scale values appear to be at best a superficial representation of participants' satisfaction. It is concluded that quantitative approaches are of limited utility in studies of the quality of life, and that they are most appropriately viewed as supplementary to approaches employing qualitative data and analysis.     

Religion in Social Change and Social Evolution

It is now time to try to pull together some of the themes and questions raised by the contributors to this book. My comments are not intended to settle controversies but merely to offer one more or less coherent opinion. My purpose is to help some readers to see the book as a whole. Other readers will need no help and may find my comments either wrong or nearly self-evident.