The sociology of consumption: Deriving new social indicators

A new area of research is emerging from an integration of sociology and consumer research. It is called the ‘sociology of consumption’. To date, its applications have been most thoroughly spelled out for marketers and consumer researchers. This paper explores the relevance of the sociology of consumption for social indicators research. It begins by defining this new area of research, then it discusses how a society's consumption may be conceptualized and measured. It concludes with several examples of how the study of consumption can not only be used to characterize societies but to reveal their social processes as well.     

Testing for homogeneity in cross-lagged panel studies

Panel studies are statistical studies in which two or more variables are observed for two or more subjects at two or more points In time. Cross- lagged panel studies are those studies in which the variables are continuous and divide naturally into two effects or impacts of each set of variables on the other. If a regression approach is taken5 a regression structure Is formulated for the cross-lagged models This structure may assume that the regression parameters are homogeneous across waves and across subpopulations. Under such assumptions the methods of multivariate regression analysis can be adapted to make inferences about the parameters. These inferences are limited to the degree that homogeneity of the parameters Is 'supported b}T the data. We consider the problem of testing the hypotheses of homogeneity and consider the problem of making statistical inferences about the cross-effects should there be evidence against one of the homogeneity assumptions. We demonstrate the methods developed by applying then to two panel data sets.     

Social Capital,Economic Hardship,and Health: A Test of the Buffering Hypothesis in Transition and Nontransition Countries

Social capital is positively associated with a number of health outcomes, and it is theorized that social capital serves as a “buffer” during economic hard times, reducing the negative quality of life impacts of economic hardship. Using self-rated health as the outcome variable, we test whether social capital modifies the effect of economic hardship in a sample of 35 transition and non-transition countries and multilevel ordinal logistic regression models that interact social capital with economic hardship variables. Overall, we find consistent evidence that social capital improves health but our analyses do not suggest that social capital conditions the effect of economic hardship. Hence, social capital does not appear to act as “buffer” during trying economic times. We suggest that more research is needed to truly understand how social capital improves health.     

Patterns of Sexual Behaviors in Young Men Who Have Sex With Men in Mexico

Recent research has documented the importance of understanding the multidimensional nature of sexual risk behavior. However, little is known about patterns of sexual behavior among men who have sex with men (MSM) in Mexico, men who are at greatest risk for HIV and sexually transmitted infections compared to other subpopulations in the country. This study applied latent class analysis to data from a large, HIV-negative sample of 18- to 25-year-old Mexican MSM recruited from a social and sexual networking website (N = 3,722) to uncover multidimensional patterns of sexual behaviors, partner factors, and protective behaviors, and examine how these were associated with health and well-being correlates. We selected a model with seven classes. The most common class included those who reported both insertive and receptive behaviors with more than one partner, but smaller groups of individuals were in classes marked by only insertive or receptive anal sex, romantic relationships, or sexual inactivity. Class membership differed by sexual orientation, age, depressive symptoms, alcohol problems, and self-acceptance, with individuals in a class marked by same-sex relationships generally reporting more positive outcomes. Findings suggest heterogeneity of behaviors among Mexican MSM and the possible efficacy of prevention messages tailored to individuals’ specific patterns of sexual behavior.     

American Conservatism and Government Funding of the Social Sciences and the Arts*

The efforts of the Reagan Administration to cut government funding for the arts and the social sciences reflects not only a general desire to curtail government spending but also a specific conservative effort to “defund the Left” by eliminating especially those programs regarded by conservatives as the basic source of liberal and radical social change in the United States. This paper examines the conservative animus against government support for the arts and the social sciences. The discussion has four parts: The first traces the history of contemporary American conservatism and identifies its central ideological themes. The second argues that the belief that government and intellectuals are the two main sources of liberal social change has led conservatives to target government programs allegedly guilty of social activism and to develop their own relatively autonomous counterintellectual network. The third examines how this political agenda and institutional structure have influenced conservative opposition to government funding of the social sciences and the arts. The final part suggests some implications our analysis has for defending the social sciences and the arts.     

Wholly responsible for a part, or partly responsible for a whole? The concept of spiritual care in nursing

Spiritual care is an inseparable part of patient care--not the exclusive province of chaplains, religious nurses, or would-be psychoanalysts. Its essence is the capacity to enter the world of others and respond to them with feeling, and every nurse should feel confident about giving such care.     

Mythos Flexibilisierung?

In this article, we address the current debate of increasing work life flexibility in (West-) Germany. In order to shed some light on the contradiction between a widely accepted decrease in work life stability and empirical findings that do not confirm such a decline, we contrast “objective” evidence from occupational trajectories with “subjective” evidence on various dimensions of perceived continuity and discontinuity of job histories. We use the West German part of the German Life History Study for a survival analysis of occupational mobility for cohorts born between 1929 and 1971. Here, using a new concept, we distinguish between direct mobility and indirect mobility which is defined as an occupational change that happens after an employment interruption. In addition, we analyze a new German cross-sectional data set from 2005 on retrospective career perceptions. We employ multinomial regression models to understand whether younger individuals report more unwanted occupational mobility and employment interruptions than older individuals. Our findings indicate that direct occupational mobility has neither increased across cohorts nor has it surged upward for the most recent cohorts, but that there has been an increase in indirect occupational mobility. Furthermore, while there is no higher incidence of unwanted occupational mobility in younger age groups, we find mixed evidence regarding the increased occurrence of unwanted career interruptions in younger age groups. Finally, the desire to experience occupational and firm changes has grown for younger age groups.     

Lesbian classics in Germany? A film historical analysis of Mädchen in Uniform (1931 and 1958)

The films M?dchen in Uniform (Leontine Sagan, 1931, Germany; Géza von Radványi, 1958, Germany) both tell the story of a schoolgirl falling in love with her teacher at a Prussian boarding school. Whereas the 1931 version is regarded as a lesbian classic in queer (German) cinema, the 1958 remake, however, is not even considered part of the lesbian genre. The following analysis examines both films within their historical context to answer the question what makes M?dchen in Uniform (1931) a lesbian film and why the remake did not measure up to its original's significance.