Published in 1937 to serve as a course plan, How to Interpret Social Work focuses on how to talk about social work in a range of public spheres, from informal and familiar approaches to more formalized and skilled techniques needed in addressing the general public.
HELEN CODY BAKER was publicity director at the Council of Social Agencies of Chicago.
MARY SWAIN ROUTZAHN was director at the Department of Social Work Interpretation of the Russell Sage Foundation.
A volume of Social Science Frontiers, a series of publications reviewing new fields for social development, aimed at foundation executives, administrators of research grant programs, directors of research organizations, and others concerned with making contemporary social science more useful for the function of social reporting.
OTIS DUDLEY DUNCAN was professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin.
This book, published in 1955, is a successor to Joanna C. Colcord's Your Community: Its Provision for Health, Education, Safety, and Welfare, published by the Russell Sage Foundation in 1939. It is designed as a broadly conceived working manual of community study aimed at not just social workers, like its predecessor, but a more varied group of citizens. It details procedures for conducting the survey, both in its organizational and methodological aspects.
ROLAND L. WARREN was professor of sociology at Alfred University.
Published in 1924, this book is a compiled reading list of reference works that relate to publicity methods in social work. Most do not directly reference social work publicity, but are useful in promoting in the social, religious, or educational fields in one way or another.
EVART G. ROUTZAHN was associate director of the Department of Surveys and Exhibits at the Russell Sage Foundation.
MARY SWAIN ROUTZAHN was director of the Department of Social Work Interpretation at the Russell Sage Foundation.
The Health Show Comes to Town is a report of a public health education campaign led by Dr. W.W. Peter in U.S. cities.
EVART G. ROUTZAHN was associate director of the Department of Surveys and Exhibits at the Russell Sage Foundation.
This book, published in 1920, examines a then-recent phenomenon of combining educational material and presentations with transportation facilities: the putting of exhibits, demonstrations, films, and other campaigning equipment on railroad trains, trolley cars, and motor trucks so that they may tour a large area of land. These vehicles were used to teach health, sanitation, and safety. Presented here is a review of these practices, with commentary by the author, aiming to stimulate the creation of new forms of illustrative material.
MARY SWAIN ROUTZAHN was director at the Department of Social Work Interpretation of the Russell Sage Foundation.
Paper read before the division on organization of social forces at the New Orleans meeting of the National Conference of Social Work, April, 1920
E.G. ROUTZAHN was associate director of the department of surveys and exhibits of the Russell Sage Foundation.
The Family Court system is a major influence in the lives of poor families. Research in this setting reveals important linkages between social inequality, cultural contact between native-born and immigrant populations, and family well-being. On the one hand, Family Court involvement can open considerable resources to families in crisis; on the other hand, manifestations of social inequalities in family life, such as homelessness or substance abuse, are often reasons why Family Court involvement is compelled in the first place.
In January 1980 a panel of distinguished social scientists and statisticians assembled at the National Academy of Sciences to begin a thorough review of the uses, reliability, and validity of surveys purporting to measure such subjective phenomena as attitudes, opinions, beliefs, and preferences. This review was prompted not only by the widespread use of survey results in both academic and non-academic settings, but also by a proliferation of apparent discrepancies in allegedly equivalent measurements and by growing public concern over the value of such measurements.
This two-volume report of the panel’s findings is certain to become one of the standard works in the field of survey measurement. Volume I summarizes the state of the art of surveying subjective phenomena, evaluates contemporary measurement programs, examines the uses and abuses of such surveys, and candidly assesses the problems affecting them. The panel also offers strategies for improving the quality and usefulness of subjective survey data. In volume II, individual panel members and other experts explore in greater depth particular theoretical and empirical topics relevant to the panel’s conclusions.
For social scientists and policymakers who conduct, analyze, and rely on surveys of the national state of mind, this comprehensive and current review will be an invaluable resource.
CHARLES F. TURNER is professor of Applied Social Research at the City University of New York.
ELIZABETH MARTIN is research associate at the National Research Council.
CONTRIBUTORS: Robert P. Abelson, Barbara A. Bailar, Marian Ballard, Theresa J. Demaio, Otis Dudley Duncan, Baruch Fischhoff, Lester R. Frankel, William H. Kruskal, Michael B. Mackuen, Catherine Marsch, Elizabeth Martin, Sara B. Nerlove, Howard Schuman, Tom W. Smith, Charles F. Turner
Winner of the 2014 Frank Luther Mott-Kappa Tau Alpha Research Award
“Based on a unique sequence of national surveys tracking the 2008 presidential election, The Obama Effect is a breakthrough study. Vividly written, it simultaneously demonstrates the resilience of racial prejudice and the reality of racial progress.”
—PAUL SNIDERMAN, Fairleigh S. Dickinson Jr. Professor of Public Policy and senior fellow, Hoover Institution and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University
“Seth Goldman and Diana Mutz’s rigorous demonstration of the positive Obama effect gives us reason for optimism that racial attitudes, although difficult to change, are nonetheless susceptible to conventional political communications and campaigns. This fine book also validates efforts to combat stereotypical portrayals in the media by showing the power of exemplary images and role models to influence how people think about race in this country.”
—DENNIS CHONG, chair and professor of political science, University of Southern California
Barack Obama’s historic 2008 campaign exposed many white Americans more than ever before to a black individual who defied negative stereotypes. While Obama’s politics divided voters, Americans uniformly perceived Obama as highly successful, intelligent, and charismatic. What effect, if any, did the innumerable images of Obama and his family have on racial attitudes among whites? In The Obama Effect, Seth K. Goldman and Diana C. Mutz uncover persuasive evidence that white racial prejudice toward blacks significantly declined during the Obama campaign. Their innovative research rigorously examines how racial attitudes form, and whether they can be changed for the better.
The Obama Effect draws from a survey of 20,000 people, whom the authors interviewed up to five times over the course of a year. This panel survey sets the volume apart from most research on racial attitudes. From the summer of 2008 through Obama’s inauguration in 2009, there was a gradual but clear trend toward lower levels of white prejudice against blacks. Goldman and Mutz argue that these changes occurred largely without people’s conscious awareness. Instead, as Obama became increasingly prominent in the media, he emerged as an “exemplar” that countered negative stereotypes in the minds of white Americans. Unfortunately, this change in attitudes did not last. By 2010, racial prejudice among whites had largely returned to pre-2008 levels. Mutz and Goldman argue that news coverage of Obama declined substantially after his election, allowing other, more negative images of African Americans to re-emerge in the media. The Obama Effect arrives at two key conclusions: Racial attitudes can change even within relatively short periods of time, and how African Americans are portrayed in the mass media affects how they change.
While Obama’s election did not usher in a “post-racial America,” The Obama Effect provides hopeful evidence that racial attitudes can—and, for a time, did—improve during Obama’s campaign. Engaging and thorough, this volume offers a new understanding of the relationship between the mass media and racial attitudes in America.
SETH K. GOLDMAN is Honors Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
DIANA C. MUTZ is Samuel A. Stouffer Professor of Political Science and Communication at the University of Pennsylvania.
