A Telescope on Society: Survey Research and Social Science at the University of Michigan and Beyond

2005 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 429-430
Author(s):  
James D. Wright
1955 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 10-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur Turner

This article is concerned with two of the most important variables existing in any system of human relationships: frequency of interaction and sentiment or attitude. There have been many studies of the connections between interactions and sentiment in face-to-face relations. Much of this work has been in carefully designed "laboratory" experiments, in which interaction can be measured and sentiment inferred with considerable accuracy. Homans' hypotheses concerning the influences of interaction and sentiment upon each other have also been tested in a variety of industrial situations, most notably by Homans himself in his analysis of "the bank wiring observation room" and of "The Electrical Equipment Company." The Human Relations Program of the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan has contributed further to our understanding of how sentiment and interaction are interrelated in industry, especially in the recent monograph by Seashore.


1986 ◽  
Vol 80 (2) ◽  
pp. 613-624 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian D. Silver ◽  
Barbara A. Anderson ◽  
Paul R. Abramson

The effects of respondent characteristics with regard to the propensity of nonvoters to report that they voted are examined by analyzing the vote validation studies conducted by the University of Michigan Survey Research Center in 1964, 1976, and 1980. Previous research has suggested that vote overreporting derives from the respondent's wish to appear to engage in socially desirable behavior. This earlier research suggests that the only respondent characteristic that is strongly related to overreporting is race; measures of socioeconomic status and of general political attitudes are said to be at most weakly related to the tendency to exaggerate voting. These earlier conclusions are incorrect. We measure the extent of overreporting for the population “at risk” of overreporting voting: those who did not actually vote. Respondents most inclined to overreport their voting are those who are highly educated, those most supportive of the regime norm of voting, and those to whom the norm of voting is most salient—the same characteristics that are related to the probability that a person actually votes. Blacks are only slightly more likely to overreport voting than whites. The pattern of relations between education and vote overreporting is opposite what would be found if those who falsely reported voting fit the typical image of the uneducated, uninvolved, “acquiescent” respondent who is concerned primarily with pleasing the interviewer.


1974 ◽  
Vol 68 (2) ◽  
pp. 572-591 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stanley Kelley ◽  
Thad W. Mirer

The research reported in this article involved tests of a model by which voting decisions can be explained and predicted. Data for the tests came from surveys conducted in five presidential elections by the Survey Research Center of the University of Michigan. Predictions made in terms of the model show it to be a good basis both for predicting the division of the vote and for predicting the votes of individual voters. Extensive analyses of incorrect predictions suggest them to be in great part the sort of errors one would expect, were voters arriving at their voting decisions in the manner described by the model. The validity of the model has implications of importance for practical politics, political history, and political theory.


1968 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 443-467 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Kent Jennings ◽  
Richard Niemi

The authors take issue with a widely accepted developmental model which suggests that almost all of political socialization occurs in the elementary school years. They re-examine some of the research on which the model was based in light of original data gathered by the Survey Research Center of the University of Michigan.


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