@lenskiStatusCrystallizationNonVertical1954

(1954) - Gerhard E. Lenski

Journal: American Sociological Review
Link:: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2087459?origin=crossref
DOI:: 10.2307/2087459
Links::
Tags:: #paper #SocialClass
Cite Key:: [@lenskiStatusCrystallizationNonVertical1954]

Abstract

Notes

"m Aristotle to Marx to Warner, most social philosophers and social scientists have described the vertical structure of human groups in terms of a single hierarchy in which each member occupies a single position. D" (Lenski 1954:406)

"uni-dimensional view is inadequate to describe the complexities of group structure. Th" (Lenski 1954:406)

"heoretically it becomes possible to conceive of a non-vertical dimension to individual or family status-that is, a consistency dimension. In this dimension units may be compared with respect to the degree of consistency of their positions in the several vertical hierarchies. In other words, certain units may be consistently high or consistently low, while others may combine high standing with respect to certain status variables with low standing with respect to others.'" (Lenski 1954:406)

"Two basic variables employed in the present study require operational definition. These are (1) social status, and (2) status crystallization." (Lenski 1954:407)

"Social status. For operational purposes, the statuses of respondents were defined in terms of their relative positions in four vertical hierarchies: the income hierarchy; the occupation hierarchy; the education hierarchy; and the ethnic hierarchy. The" (Lenski 1954:407)

"Status crystallization. Having established the structure of these vertical hierarchies, the next problem was to establish common scales for all of them, so that the relative position of respondents in the several hierarchies might be compared. Without common scales, a measure of status crystallization would be impossible. To this end, frequency distributions were established for each hierarchy. Usi" (Lenski 1954:408)

"On the basis of the data described above, it would therefore appear that a definite association existed between low crystallization and political liberalism among respondents in this cross-section sample of metropolitan Detroit." (Lenski 1954:411)

"Two tentative conclusions may be drawn from a careful analysis of Table 6. First, liberal political tendencies are associated with a low degree of status crystallization regardless of the specific relationship of the status variables. T" (Lenski 1954:412)

"The data in Table 6 also suggest the tentative conclusion that certain types of status inconsistencies are more closely related to political liberalism than others." (Lenski 1954:412)

"Not only do the findings in the preceding section suggest that a recognition of this non-vertical dimension of social status may help account for some of the previously unexplained variance in political behavior, but also they hint at a more basic relationship between social structure and social change." (Lenski 1954:412)

"account for an important part of the variance in the phenomena under investigation. ing the past two decades it has become fashionable in social science circles to construct indices of socio-economic status by averaging up in some manner several status variables.21 The findings of this present study indicate that such constructions are seriously deficient in characterizing the social status of a significant minority of the population. Such techniques for classifying individuals fail to take into account what appears to be an important dimension of status, and thus may frequently fail to 21 See, for example, W. Lloyd Warner, et al., Social Class in A merica, Chicago: Science Research Associates, 1949, Part 3; or Clyde V. Kiser and P. K. Whelpton, "Social and Psychological Factors Affecting Fertility, IX. Fertility Planning and Fertility Rates by Socio-Economic Status," Milbank Memorial Fund Quarterly, 27 (1949), pp. 214-16." (Lenski 1954:414)