Coleman’s Boat Revisited: Causal Sequences and the Micro-macro Link

2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 368-391 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gustav Ramström
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Macro Model ◽  
Empirical Social Science ◽  
The Individual

This article argues that empirical social scientists can be freed from having to account for “micro-to-macro transitions.” The article shows, in opposition to the (still) dominant perspective based on Coleman’s macro-micro-macro model, that no micro-macro transitions or mechanisms connect the individual level to the macro level in empirical social science. Rather, when considering that social macro entities and properties are micro manifest rather than macro manifest, it becomes clear that the micro-macro move in empirical social science is purely conceptual or analytical.

The Innovators

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara J. Risman
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Gender Equality ◽  
Gender Stereotypes ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Gender Expectations ◽  
Personal Lives ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Gendered Expectations ◽  
Level Of Analysis

This chapter introduces the innovators and provides a portrait of them. The chapter analyzes these innovators at the individual, interactional, and macro level of the gender structure. The chapter begins at the individual level of analysis because these young people emphasize how they challenge gender by rejecting requirements to restrict their personal activities, goals, and personalities to femininity or masculinity. They refuse to live within gender stereotypes. These Millennials do not seem driven by their feminist ideological beliefs, although they do have them. Their worldviews are more taken for granted than central to their stories. Nor are they consistently challenging gender expectations for others, although they often ignore the gender expectations they face themselves. They innovate primarily in their personal lives, although they do reject gendered expectations at the interactional level and hold feminist ideological beliefs about gender equality.

The True Believers

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara J. Risman
Keyword(s):  
Gender Differences ◽  
Social Networks ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Gender Ideology ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Gender Differentiation ◽  
The World ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Gendered Expectations

This is the first data chapter. In this chapter, respondents who are described as true believers in the gender structure, and essentialist gender differences are introduced and their interviews analyzed. They are true believers because, at the macro level, they believe in a gender ideology where women and men should be different and accept rules and requirements that enforce gender differentiation and even sex segregation in social life. In addition, at the interactional level, these Millennials report having been shaped by their parent’s traditional expectations and they similarly feel justified to impose gendered expectations on those in their own social networks. At the individual level, they have internalized masculinity or femininity, and embody it in how they present themselves to the world. They try hard to “do gender” traditionally.

scholarly journals Do shared values promote social cohesion? If so, which? Evidence from Denmark

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen N. Breidahl ◽  
Nils Holtug ◽  
Kristian Kongshøj
Keyword(s):  
Social Cohesion ◽  
Shared Values ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Community Values ◽  
Liberal Nationalism ◽  
National Values ◽  
Liberal Citizenship ◽  
The One ◽  
The Individual

Social scientists and political theorists often claim that shared values are conducive to social cohesion, and trust and solidarity in particular. Furthermore, this idea is at the heart of what has been labeled the ‘national identity argument’, according to which religious and/or cultural diversity is a threat to the shared (national) values underpinning social cohesion and redistributive justice. However, there is no consensus among political theorists about what values we need to share to foster social cohesion and indeed, for example, nationalists, liberals, and multiculturalists provide different answers to this question. On the basis of a survey conducted in Denmark in 2014, this study empirically investigates the relation between, on the one hand, commitments to the community values of respectively conservative nationalism, liberal nationalism, liberal citizenship, and multiculturalism, and on the other, trust and solidarity. First, we investigate in what ways commitments to these four sets of values are correlated to trust and solidarity at the individual level and, then, whether the belief that others share one’s values is correlated to these aspects of social cohesion for individuals committed to these four sets of values. We find that conservative and liberal nationalism are negatively correlated to our different measures of trust and solidarity, whereas liberal citizenship and (in particular) multiculturalism are positively correlated. In broad terms, this picture remains when we control for a number of socio-economic factors and ideology (on a left-right scale). Finally, individuals who believe that others share their values do not, in general, have higher levels of trust and solidarity. Rather, this belief works in different ways when associated with different sets of community values.

scholarly journals The Conflicting Impact of COVID-19’s Health and Economic Crises on Helping

2020 ◽  
pp. 105960112096870
Author(s):  
Mindy K. Shoss ◽  
Kristin A. Horan ◽  
Michael DiStaso ◽  
Chelsea A. LeNoble ◽  
Anthony Naranjo
Keyword(s):  
System Theory ◽  
Economic Crisis ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Economic Crises ◽  
Negatively Associated ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Search Volume ◽  
Event System ◽  
Work Hour ◽  
The Individual

Helping behaviors are considered critical for business and societal recovery in light of economic crises and natural disasters, including the COVID-19 pandemic that has both economic and health disaster elements. However, because the current COVID-19 pandemic has both of these elements, it is unclear how helping may be impacted. Economic crisis research suggests that such events are associated with less helping, whereas disaster research suggests that such events are associated with greater helping. We pair the event system theory (Morgeson, F. P., Mitchell, T. R., & Liu, D. (2015). Event system theory: An event-oriented approach to the organizational sciences. Academy of Management Review, 40(4), 515-537) with these two logics (economic downturn and disaster) to suggest that health and economic threats within the COVID-19 pandemic operate with potentially opposing forces on helping-related outcomes. To test these ideas at a macro-level, we examined internet search volume for recession, COVID-19, and interest in helping. At a micro-level, we examined the relationships between work- hour insecurity and perceived job-related COVID-19 risk—two salient COVID-19-related economic and health threats—and helping customers and coworkers. Consistent with economic crisis logic, macro-level concern about recession was negatively associated with interest in helping. Moreover, at the individual level, work-hour insecurity negatively predicted helping coworkers. Consistent with disaster logic, at the individual level, perceived job-related COVID-19 threat was positively associated with helping coworkers and negatively associated with helping customers. These findings suggest that the specific feature of the COVID-19 event system (economic versus health) and the target (organizational insiders versus outsiders) matter for shaping helping behavior. These findings have implications for helping during crises that involve economic and/or disaster elements.

scholarly journals Factors influencing time allocation of sport event volunteers

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 316-331 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirstin Hallmann ◽  
Paul Downward ◽  
Geoff Dickson
Keyword(s):  
Time Allocation ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Sport Event ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Factors Influencing ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Sport Events ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Sport Event Volunteers

Purpose Given the increasing demands placed on a sport event workforce in servicing the needs of spectators, to attract and recruit volunteers to the industry, it is important for sport event managers to know what is driving how much time volunteers allocate to an event. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the individual and macro-level factors influencing the allocation of time to volunteer at sport events. Design/methodology/approach Survey data were collected from volunteers at 25 sport events (n=2,303). Multi-level modelling was used to identify common effects controlling for event differences. Findings Male gender significantly influences time allocated to an event at the individual level. At the macro-level, the number of local inhabitants has a significant negative effect whereas the status of an international event and duration contribute positively to time allocation. Research limitations/implications The results provide clear evidence that macro-level variables can stimulate interest in event volunteering opportunities. Originality/value This paper uses a multi-level approach to assess the influence of micro- and macro-level variables on time allocation by sport event volunteers. Using this approach, event heterogeneity can be controlled.

scholarly journals Methodological Issues in Studies of Cultural Legacies in Post-Socialist Russia’s Civil Society

2015 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 145-165
Author(s):  
Anna Leskinen
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Empirical Research ◽  
The State ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Theoretical Assumptions ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
Cultural Legacies ◽  
The Individual

AbstractThe state of civil society in post-socialist Russia and other former socialist countries is of great interest to social scientists, policy makers, and development-oriented practitioners. Numerous theoretical assumptions and methodological approaches have been used by researchers to describe, analyze, and assess the state of civil society in Russia, for example. One of the key issues addressed has been the influences on citizens’ civic and social activities and the historical conditions and cultural environments that have generated – and continue to generate – these activities. This critique focuses on the concept of “communist legacies” which has been applied at the individual level to explain people’s preferences, attitudes, and forms of behavior in Russia and other post-socialist countries. The concept is influential, in large part, because it has been supported by empirical research, especially the highly influential empirical research of Marc Howard. This paper takes a critical look at this research, including its theoretical frame and the methodology associated with the frame.

scholarly journals Religiousness and existential insecurity: A cross-national comparative analysis on the macro- and micro-level

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franz Höllinger ◽  
Johanna Muckenhuber
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Life Conditions ◽  
Micro Level ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Level Analysis ◽  
Cross National

In Sacred and Secular (2011 [2004]) Norris and Inglehart argued that improvements in material living conditions and higher degrees of existential security lead to a decline in religiousness both on the macro-level of the comparison between countries and on the individual level. Since then, a number of studies have examined this relationship and confirmed the assumptions of the existential security thesis. This article revisits this thesis using data from the sixth wave of the World Values Survey (2010–2014). The multi-level analysis reveals two key results. Consistent with previous studies, a strong correlation was found between better life conditions and lower levels of religiousness on the macro-level. Individual life conditions and threatening experiences, however, have only a very small impact on religiousness. Possible explanations for the discrepancy between macro-level and micro-level results are discussed in the final section.

scholarly journals Money for the marginalized: Promoting access to income benefits in Manitoba

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Schachter
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Realist Evaluation ◽  
Vital Role ◽  
Evaluation Methodology ◽  
Structural Level ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Dual Objectives

Low-income Manitobans are eligible for a variety of federal and provincial income support benefits that may help them meet their basic needs. However, many face barriers to completing the bureaucratic processes required to access these benefits. In response, nonprofit and public sector agencies have developed free benefit intermediary programs that support low-income community members to claim their benefits. Despite the growth of this field, there is a dearth of scholarly literature on programs that promote access to income benefits. This thesis contributes to filling this gap through a mixed-methods study of benefit intermediary programs operating in Winnipeg, MB. Using a realist evaluation methodology, this study examines contextual conditions that inhibit benefit take-up and the field of social programs that promote access to benefits. The evaluation considers the social-structural context, program goals and activities, and key program mechanisms that may account for the outcomes that ensue. Findings from semi-structured key informant interviews and a literature review demonstrate that benefit intermediary programs have dual objectives that correspond to two of Nancy Fraser’s strategies for achieving social justice. At the individual level, they employ a strategy of affirmative redistribution to assist low-income community members to claim benefits that increase their quality of life. At a structural level, they pursue nonreformist reforms to reduce systemic barriers that inhibit benefit take-up and build cross-sectoral capacity to promote access. However, these programs face constraints that limit the scope of their direct service delivery and the extent to which they can effect structural change. Nevertheless, benefit intermediaries play a vital role in promoting access to income benefits in Manitoba. This research may be useful for practitioners, policymakers, and social scientists who are interested in the problem of benefit non-take-up, or who are engaged in efforts to increase the take-up of money for the marginalized.

scholarly journals Towards victim-oriented crime modelling in a social science e-infrastructure

2011 ◽  
Vol 369 (1949) ◽  
pp. 3353-3371 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nick Malleson ◽  
Mark Birkin
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Social Research ◽  
Research Programme ◽  
Prevention Strategies ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Agent Based ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Realistic Representation ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Burglary Risk

The National e-Infrastructure for Social Simulation (NeISS) is a multi-disciplinary collaboration between computation and social science within the UK Digital Social Research programme. The project aims to develop new tools and services for social scientists and planners to assist in performing ‘what-if’ scenario predictions in a variety of policy contexts. A key part of the NeISS remit is to explore real-world scenarios and evaluate real policy applications. Research into the processes and drivers behind crime is an important application area that has major implications for both improving crime-related policy and developing effective crime prevention strategies. This paper will discuss how the current e-infrastructure and available microsimulation tools can be used to improve an existing agent-based burglary simulation (BurgdSIM) by including a more realistic representation of the victims of crime. Results show that the model produces different spatial patterns when individual-level victim data are used and a risk profile of the synthetic victims suggests which types of people have the largest burglary risk.

scholarly journals Popularity equilibrium: Testing a general theory of local campaign effectiveness

2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (5) ◽  
pp. 529-542 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edward Fieldhouse ◽  
Justin Fisher ◽  
David Cutts
Keyword(s):  
District Level ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Curvilinear Relationship ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
General Elections ◽  
Measuring Campaign ◽  
Local Candidate ◽  
Party Support ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Electoral Performance

Parties and candidates target campaign resources where they are most likely to pay electoral dividends. At the individual level it has been shown that some individuals are more likely to be persuaded by campaign contacts than others. In a parallel tradition of measuring campaign effectiveness at the macro level, previous research has demonstrated that local candidate campaign effort measured is significantly related to electoral performance. However, while there is evidence suggestive of macro level effects, there is little systematic evidence about the district level conditions under which campaign efforts are most productive. Drawing on extensive data across six UK general elections between 1992 and 2015, we advance a theory of local campaign efficacy and test a general model of popularity equilibrium. We demonstrate that there is a curvilinear relationship between the underlying level of party support in an electoral district and the intensity of the district-level campaign – there is a ‘sweet-spot’ for maximizing the returns of campaign effort.

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