This splendid introduction to social research describes an area of scientific investigation that profoundly influences our daily lives and thoughts, but about which most of us know very little. We can picture a research chemist at work, white-coated and surrounded by beakers and test tubes—but what is the nature of social research? For interested general readers and particularly for students entering the various social science fields, Morton Hunt paints an immensely informative and accessible portrait.

He begins with a lucid overview of the important varieties of social research, describing their advantages and limitations. Against this background, Hunt then details five remarkable case histories, eyewitness accounts of significant recent episodes in social research. Woven skillfully through each narrative are explorations of the basic methodological, practical, moral and political issues raised by social research. The story of a noteworthy series of sociopsychological experiments on teamwork, for example, enables Hunt to weigh the merits of using a laboratory setting to study social behavior and the ethics of deceiving human subjects. In similar fashion, Hunt depicts a historic cross-sectional survey on segregated schooling; a complex attempt to measure the impact of welfare programs; a real-world experiment with guaranteed annual incomes; and a path-breaking study of human aging that followed its subjects for a generation.

This engaging and intelligent book will give readers a new understanding of the breadth and richness of social research as well as an informed appreciation of its significance for their lives.

MORTON HUNT is the author of many books and articles about the social and behavioral sciences, most recently The Universe Within: A New Science Explores the Human Mind (1982).

Policymakers, medical practitioners, and the public alike face an increasingly bewildering flood of new and often contradictory scientific studies on almost every topic. Whether the issue is the the best treatment for breast cancer, the need for prenatal food programs to improve the health of poor infants and mothers, or the ability of women to succeed in scientific professions, the healthy growth of modern science has at times done more to stir up controversy than to establish reliable knowledge. But now scientists in several fields have developed a sophisticated new methodology called meta-analysis to address this problem. By numerically combining diverse research findings on a single question, meta-analysis can be used to identify their central tendency and reach conclusions far more reliable than those of any single investigation.

How Science Takes Stock vividly tells the story of meta-analysis through the eyes of its architects and champions, and chronicles its history, techniques, achievements, and controversies. Noted science author Morton Hunt visits key practitioners and recounts their use of meta-analysis to resolve important scientific puzzles and longstanding debates. Does psychotherapy work, and if so what form works best? Does spending federal money on education really improve student performance? Can a single enzyme significantly decrease the risk of heart attack? Do boot camps reduce juvenile delinquency? With each account, Hunt illustrates the major components of the meta-analytic method, reveals strategies for resolving practical and theoretical problems, and discusses the impact of meta-analysis on the science and policy communities. In many cases, he demonstrates how meta-analysts have gone a step further to determine the causes of earlier discrepancies. In this way they not only identify successful approaches to the question at hand, but also clarify the conditions under which they will work best. Hunt also portrays the important but frequently controversial business of doing meta-analysis for legislators and government agencies, particularly in sensitive areas of social policy.

How Science Takes Stock demonstrates how the statistical techniques of meta-analysis produce more accurate data than the standard literature review or the old-fashioned process of tallying up the results of each scientific study as if they were votes in an election to decide the truth. Hunt also addresses issues of quality control in each phase of the meta-analytic process, and answers skeptics who claim that the dissimilarities between studies are often too significant for meta-analysis to be any more than an apples and oranges approach. This volume conveys the power of meta-analysis to help social policymakers and health professionals resolve their most pressing problems. How Science Takes Stock concludes with a discussion of the future of meta-analysis that examines its potential for further refinements, its growth in the scientific literature, and exciting new possibilities for its future use. An appendix by meta-analysis expert Harris Cooper offers some finer points on the mechanics of conducting a meta-analytic investigation.

MORTON HUNT writes about the social and behavioral sciences. He attended Temple University and the University of Pennsylvania, worked briefly on the staffs of two magazines, and since 1949 has been a freelance writer. He has written eighteen books and some 450 articles. He has won a number of prestigious science-writing awards.

Educational and psychological tests are often used in ways which touch most intimately the lives of people. For example, tests may influence who gets a job or who is selected to attend a college or graduate school. But not everyone has agreed that tests are a good thing. Over the past twenty years a wave of complaints has led to congressional hearings, court cases, and formal grievances before state and federal commissions. Holmen and Docter have analyzed these complaints and criticisms not only by considering the tests themselves but through examining the ways tests are used as elements in assessment systems.

The applications of tests in clinical and counseling work, in educational achievement testing, and in personnel selection is discussed and evaluated. While the least amount of testing is in the personnel selections area, this is where the most complaints are found. Educational achievement testing has by far the largest testing programs and a wide range of criticisms has been voiced concerning this kind of assessment. Testing in connection with clinical and counseling work has generated the least public concern.

An extensive analysis is given of the organizations which comprise the testing industry, including the various developers and publishers of tests and also test scoring organizations. The users of tests are considered from the standpoint of their professional training and also in terms of how their organizations influence technical standards of test development.

MILTON G. HOLMEN is professor of management and associate dean of the School of Business Administration, University of Southern California, Los Angeles.

RICHARD F. DOCTER is professor of psychology at San Fernando Valley State College.

American democracy relies on an accurate census to fairly allocate political representation and billions of dollars in federal funds. Declining participation in previous censuses and a general waning of civic engagement in society raised the possibility that the 2000 count would miss many Americans—disproportionately ethnic and racial minorities—depriving them of their share of influence in American society and yielding an unfair distribution of federal resources. Faced with this possibility, the Census Bureau launched a massive mobilization campaign to encourage Americans to complete and return their census forms. In The Hard Count, former Census Bureau director Kenneth Prewitt, D. Sunshine Hillygus, Norman H. Nie, and Heili Pals present a rigorous evaluation of this campaign. Can a busy, mobile, disengaged public be motivatived to participate in this civic activity? Using a rich set of data and drawing on theories of civic mobilization, political persuasion, and media effects, the authors assess the factors that influenced participation in the 2000 census.

The Hard Count profiles a watershed moment in the history of the American census. As the mobilization campaign was underway, political opposition to the census sprang up, citing privacy issues and seeking to limit the kind of data the census could collect. Hillygus, Nie, Prewitt, and Pals analyze the competing effects of the mobilization campaign and the privacy controversy on public attitudes and cooperation with the census. Using an internet based survey, the authors tracked a representative sample of Americans over time to gauge changes in census attitudes, privacy concerns, and their eventual decision whether or not to return their census form. The study uniquely captures the public’s exposure to census advertising, community mobilization, and news stories, and was designed so people could view video clips and photos of actual campaign advertisements on their sets in their homes. The authors find that the Census Bureau campaign did in fact raise awareness of the census and census participation. The mobilization campaign was especially effective at increasing participation among groups historically undercounted by the census. They also find that census participation would have been higher if not for the privacy controversy, which discouraged many people from cooperating with the census and led others to omit information from their census form. The findings of The Hard Count have important policy implications for future census counts and offer theoretical insights regarding the influence of mobilization campaigns on civic participation.

The goal of full and equal cooperation with the decennial census and other government surveys is an important national priority. The Hard Count shows that a mobilization campaign can dramatically increase voluntary participation in the decennial headcount and identifies emerging social and political challenges that may threaten future census counts and contribute to the growing fragility of our national statistical system.

D. SUNSHINE HILLYGUS is assistant professor of government at Harvard University.

NORMAN H. NIE is director of the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society.

KENNETH PREWITT is Carnegie Professor of Public Affairs at Columbia University.

HEILI PALS is a doctoral student in the Department of Sociology at Stanford University.

A Volume in the RSF Census Series

Shows why social statistics are important and how they are put to use in the interest of the public. Written by a sociologist who serves as Director of the Population Research Center at the University of Chicago, the book illustrates the many applications social statistics have for governmental agencies at the federal, state, and local levels; for the business community; for labor unions; for educators and researchers; and for the general public. The author provides a description of the major bodies of social statistical information, including population; births, deaths, and health; marriage, divorce, and the family; education; the labor force; crime; consumption and the consumer; recreation; governments; and public opinion polls.

PHILIP M. HAUSER is Lucy Flower Professor of Urban Sociology and director of the Population Research Center at the University of Chicago.

A volume in the Social Science Frontiers series, which are occasional publications reviewing new fields for social science development.

These occasional publications seek to summarize recent work being done in particular areas of social research, to review new developments in the field, and to indicate issues needing further investigation. The publications are intended to help orient those concerned with developing current research programs and broadening the use of social science in the policy-making process.

A Volume in the the Russell Sage Foundation's Social Science Frontiers Series

Discusses the uses and abuses of intelligence testing in our educational systems. Dr. Goslin examines teachers' opinions and practices with regard to tests and finds considerable discrepancies between attitude and behavior. He points to the need for formulation of school policies that clearly specify what role teachers are to play in the measurement process. Dr. Goslin makes several policy recommendations, stressing the idea that the measuring process must take into account many aspects of a child's background and characteristics, and must guard against premature labeling or over-categorization.

DAVID A. GOSLIN was staff sociologist at the Russell Sage Foundation and author of The School in Contemporary Society and The Search for Ability: Standardized Testing in Social Perspective.

A significant and eye-opening examination of the current state of the testing movement in the United States, where more than 150 million standardized intelligence, aptitude, and achievement tests are administered annually by schools, colleges, business and industrial firms, government agencies, and the military services. Despite widespread acceptance of these ability tests, there is surprisingly little systematic information about their use or effect. This book examines, raises questions about, and points the way to needed research on ability testing. It considers the possible social, legal, and emotional impact on society, the groups and organizations that make use of the tests, and the individuals who are directly affected by the results.

DAVID A. GOSLIN is staff sociologist at the Russell Sage Foundation and author of The School in Contemporary Society.

Important differences persist between rural and urban America, despite profound economic changes and the notorious homogenizing influence of the media. As Glenn V. Fuguitt, David L. Brown, and Calvin L. Beale show in Rural and Small Town America, the much-heralded disappearance of small town life has not come to pass, and the nonmetropolitan population still constitutes a significant dimension of our nation's social structure.

Based on census and other recent survey data, this impressive study provides a detailed and comparative picture of rural America. The authors find that size of place is a critical demographic factor, affecting population composition (rural populations are older and more predominantly male than urban populations), the distribution of poverty (urban poverty tends to be concentrated in neighborhoods; rural poverty may extend over large blocks of counties), and employment opportunities (job quality and income are lower in rural areas, though rural occupational patterns are converging with those of urban areas). In general, rural and small town America still lags behind urban America on many indicators of social well-being. Pointing out that rural life is no longer synonymous with farming, the authors explore variations among nonmetropolitan populations. They also trace the impact of major national trends—the nonmetropolitan growth spurt of the 1970s and its current reversal, for example, or changing fertility rates—on rural life and on the relationship between metropolitan and nonmetropolitan communities.

By describing the special characteristics and needs of rural populations as well as the features they share with urban America, this book clearly demonstrates that a more accurate picture of nonmetropolitan life is essential to understanding the larger dynamics of our society.

GLENN V. FUGUITT is professor of rural sociology and sociology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

DAVID L. BROWN is associate director for research in the College of Agriculture and professor of rural sociology at Cornell University.

CALVIN L. BEALE is senior demographer, Economic Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture.

A Volume in the RSF Census Series

Social science research often yields conflicting results: Does juvenile delinquent rehabilitation work? Is teenage pregnancy prevention effective? In an effort to improve the value of research for shaping social policy, social scientists are increasingly employing a powerful technique called meta-analysis. By systematically pulling together findings of a particular research problem, meta-analysis allows researchers to synthesize the results of multiple studies and detect statistically significant patterns among them.

Meta-Analysis for Explanation brings exemplary illustrations of research synthesis together with expert discussion of the use of meta-analytic techniques. The emphasis throughout is on the explanatory applications of meta-analysis, a quality that makes this casebook distinct from other treatments of this methodology. The book features four detailed case studies by Betsy Jane Becker, Elizabeth C. Devine, Mark W. Lipsey, and William R. Shadish, Jr. These are offered as meta-analyses that seek both to answer the descriptive questions to which research synthesis is traditionally directed in the health and social sciences, and also to explore how a more systematic method of explanation might enhance the policy yield of research reviews.

To accompany these cases, a group of the field’s leading scholars has written several more general chapters that discuss the history of research synthesis, the use of meta-analysis and its value for scientific explanation, and the practical issues and challenges facing researchers who want to try this new technique. As a practical resource, Meta-Analysis for Explanation guides social scientists to greater levels of sophistication in their efforts to synthesize the results of social research.

"This is an important book...[it is] another step in the continuing exploration of the wider implications and powers of meta-analytic methods." —Contemporary Psychology

THOMAS D. COOK is at Northwestern University.

HARRIS COOPER is at the University of Missouri.

DAVID S. CORDRAY is at Vanderbilt University.

HEIDI HARTMANN is at Institute for Women's Policy Research.

LARRY V. HEDGES is at University of Chicago.

RICHARD J. LIGHT is at Harvard University.

THOMAS A. LOUIS is at University of Minnesota.

FREDERICK MOSTELLER is at Harvard University.