Leo Bogart, 1921-2005

Leo Bogart, who died October 15, 2005, in New York City, calledhimself an "applied sociologist" because he spent his careerin marketing rather than academic research. But his contributionsto knowledge filled 14 books, three of them published afterhe turned 80. His appreciation for the nuances of opinion measurementand contributions to question design would have earned him distinctionon any faculty, and so his career embodied the commercial-academicblend that has characterized the American Association for PublicOpinion Research (AAPOR). Born in Lvov, Poland, he moved with his family to New York atthe age of 2. He was a high school newspaper editor in     

Tending the Vineyard: Cultivating Political Process Research

Goodwin and Jasper's criticisms of various iterations of political process theory are incorrectly applied to the entire developing paradigm. Their indictment offers a rigid and narrow representation of the theory and rejects the social science enterprise of building theory altogether. At the same time, their criticisms raise important puzzles for scholars working on social movements, particularly about defining opportunities, and studying culture. I answer their criticisms of the theory, acknowledge useful questions and challenges that they offer, and conclude by suggesting an agenda for research on social movements in the future.     

Scheduling with interjob communication on parallel processors

Consider a scheduling problem in which a set of tasks needs to be scheduled on m parallel processors. Each task \(T_i\) consists of a set of jobs with interjob communication demands, represented by a weighted, undirected graph \(G_i\). The processors are assumed to be interconnected by a shared communication channel, which can be used by jobs to communicate among each other while being processed in parallel. In each time step, the scheduler assigns jobs to the processors and allows any processed job to use a certain capacity of the channel in order to satisfy (parts of) its communication demands to adjacent jobs processed in the same step. The goal is to find a schedule with minimum length in which the communication demands of all jobs are satisfied. We show that this problem is NP-hard in the strong sense even if the number of processors is constant and the underlying graph is a single path or a forest with arbitrary constant maximum degree. Consequently, we design and analyze approximation algorithms with asymptotic approximation ratio \(\min \{1.8, 1.5 \frac{m}{m-1}\}+1\) if the underlying graph G, the union of the \(G_i\), is a forest. For general graphs it is \(\min \left\{ 1.8, \frac{1.5m}{m-1}\right\} \cdot \left( \text {arb}(G) + \frac{5}{3}\right) \), where \(\text {arb}(G)\) denotes the arboricity of G.     

Agency and clientship in public encounters: co‐constructing ‘neediness’ and ‘worthiness’ in shelter placement meetings

This article seeks to develop our understanding of the agency of vulnerable groups who at first sight may not seem to have much agency in their lives. It explores the co‐constructed nature of agency in three Danish homeless shelters. Unlike earlier interview‐based studies, our research is based on naturalistic data drawn from 23 video‐recorded placement meetings. Using concepts from Goffman, we examine how versions of the neediness and worthiness of homeless people are negotiated verbally and bodily between staff and clients. We find that homeless people have to juggle two partly contradictory roles when they are given or take the roles of either a (active) citizen or a (passive) client. Clientship is actively negotiated by both parties and demonstrates the agency of homeless people: they can collaborate with (as clients) or challenge (as citizens) the staff’s attempts to formulate solutions to their troubles. We further examine how the professional ideology of client centredness affects the meeting between the two parties. However, we show that, like any discourse, client centredness has no intrinsic meaning and is played out by actors in very different ways. In work with the homeless, the discourse of client centredness is related to discourses of ‘neediness’, ‘worthiness’ and ‘value for money’ that define agency in different ways and make three different client positions available: the resolute client, the acquiescent client and the passive client.     

On the road toward the development of clothing size standards and safety devices for Chilean workers

The range of sizes used in Chile for clothing comes from criteria developed in continental Europe, mainly the EN 13402 standard. Any standard adopted by a country should consider the anthropometric dimensions of the user population, particularly to discern the ratio of garments for different size. Consequently, the purpose of this study was to propose standards for the size of clothing based on anthropometric characteristics of a sample of Chilean miners. The study was conducted in 447 male workers. The age and body weight were measured in each workers as well as their percentage of body fat. Anthropometric measurements for garments were made according to the criteria of the European Community (EN 13402-1) and ISO (8559- 1989). Body dimensions for the design of gloves, shoes, helmets and caps, clothes that cover the upper part of the body and clothes that cover the lower part were measured. The results obtained made it possible to establish the percentage of workers falling within the range of sizes that manufacturers consider as reference. One of the main conclusions of the study is the need to carefully consider a set of complementary anthropometric measures, which can help to improve the comfort of costumes, to the extent that the providers adapt their designs to the characteristics of Chilean workers.     

Radiological emergency response for community agencies with cognitive task analysis, risk analysis, and decision support framework

Radiological nuclear emergency responders must be able to coordinate evacuation and relief efforts following the release of radioactive material into populated areas. In order to respond quickly and effectively to a nuclear emergency, high-level coordination is needed between a number of large, independent organizations, including police, military, hazmat, and transportation authorities. Given the complexity, scale, time-pressure, and potential negative consequences inherent in radiological emergency responses, tracking and communicating information that will assist decision makers during a crisis is crucial. The emergency response team at the Angra dos Reis nuclear power facility, located outside of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, presently conducts emergency response simulations once every two years to prepare organizational leaders for real-life emergency situations. However, current exercises are conducted without the aid of electronic or software tools, resulting in possible cognitive overload and delays in decision-making. This paper describes the development of a decision support system employing systems methodologies, including cognitive task analysis and human-machine interface design. The decision support system can aid the coordination team by automating cognitive functions and improving information sharing. A prototype of the design will be evaluated by plant officials in Brazil and incorporated to a future trial run of a response simulation.