The goal of this exercise is to explore the differential impact of social change on three generations of Americans in the 1970s. Crosstabulations and comparison of means tests will be used.
Social change refers to any significant alteration over time in behavior patterns, cultural values, and norms. Social change can be slow or rapid; emergent (through the unfolding of daily life and small cumulative changes), transformative (through crisis) or projectable (planned). It can be caused by a variety of social, cultural, political, economic, technological, and environmental forces.
Sociologists have long been interested in studying the impact of social change on people. Some, such as 19th century sociologist Emile Durkheim, focus on the negative consequences of social change. Durkheim famously argued that rapid social change can create a normative vacuum in which the old cultural rules no longer apply. As a result, people sometimes become disoriented and experience anomie (a sense of apathy, alienation, personal distress, and cultural estrangement brought on by the lack of fit between the individual's needs and expectations and the social order) as they search for new guidelines to govern their lives.
Other theorists emphasize the transformative consequences of social change, arguing that the major historical events of an era are particularly influential in shaping the ideas and the political and social consciousness of youth reaching maturity in that era.
The US underwent profound social changes in the late 1950s and in the 1960s, with such key historical, cultural, and political events as the Civil Rights movement, massive anti-war protests, riots, and the feminist movement. This period of US history offers valuable opportunities to study both the causes and consequences of social change. Using survey data from 1971, this exercise explores the differential impact of the events of the 1950-60s on three generations of Americans.
Examples of research questions about social change:
This exercise will use the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG), which began in 1971 as a survey of intergenerational relations among 300 three-generation California families with grandparents (then in their 60s), middle-aged parents (then in their early 40s), and grandchildren (then aged 15-26). The study broadened in 1991 and now includes a fourth generation, the great-grand-children of these same families. The LSOG allows comparisons of sets of aging parents and children at the same stage of life but during different historical periods. The study examines inter-generational solidarity and conflict; the ability of families to buffer stressful life transitions; and the effects of social change on the transmission of values, resources, and behaviors. The LSOG contains information on family structure, household composition, affectual solidarity and conflict, values, attitudes, behaviors, role importance, marital relationships, health and fitness, mental health and well-being, caregiving, leisure activities, and life events and concerns. Demographic variables include age, sex, income, employment status, marital status, socioeconomic history, education, religion, ethnicity, and military service.
List of variables used:
Please note that we used the questions as they appeared in the 1971 survey, even though some of the language is no longer considered appropriate today.
In this exercise, we will explore the impact of social change on three different generations of Americans, using the 1971 implementation of the Longitudinal Survey of Generations. Please note that we used the questions as they appeared in the 1971 survey, even though some of the language is no longer considered appropriate today.
This exercise uses several opinion questions from the survey (OP5, OPNSB15, OPNSA10, OPNSA11, OP2, OPNSA13). These variables initially had four answer categories, ranging from "1," "Disagree" to "4," "Agree." We recoded the variables by collapsing the answer categories into two (1 = "Disagree" and 2 = "Agree"). The new variables are WOMLIB, CVLRGHTS1, CVLRGHTS3, SLVPBS, STRICTER, and CHANGE respectively.
Social Change and Anomie
Anomie is often characterized by feelings of alienation. The survey uses several variables to measure alienation, including: ALIEN1 ("I believe in America's goals and values"), ALIEN2 ("I feel involved and like what I do") and ALIEN4 ("My life has a lot of meaning"). Answers were coded "0" for "Yes" and "1" for "No." We created a new measure of alienation by combining these three variables. The new variable, ALIEN, is a scale ranging from "0" to "3," where higher numbers indicate greater feelings of alienation.
Consider the results of the
You may recall that anomie can also be experienced as a normative vacuum, the sense that
old cultural rules no longer apply and have not been replaced with new ones. To see how
respondents felt about this, we used the variable CONTRL2, "I know what is right and
wrong" (where "yes" was coded "1" and "no" was coded "2") in a
Finally, we looked at respondents' sense of control, using the variables CONTROL, "I
don't have influence over my life events" and INFLGOV "The average citizen can influence
government." These variables were originally named CONTRL3 and LOC4; we added labels for
readability and renamed the variables. Please examine the
Social Change in Attitudes
Respondents were asked to indicate whether they agreed or disagreed with the statement
"The 'women's liberation' ideas make a lot of sense to me" (WOMLIB). Take a look at the
results of the crosstab with
Let us take a look at the results of the crosstab of
Now please scroll down and turn your attention to the crosstab of CVLRGHTS3 and GEN. What percentage of Generation 1 respondents agreed with the view that Blacks "are asking for special treatment they're not entitled to"? How does this compare with the views of Generation 3 respondents? Do the results surprise you in light of what the previous analysis showed? What could explain the differences in how respondents answered the two questions?
Several variables can be used to measure respondents' attitudes about social order. Let's
take the variable STRICTER: "We must crack down on youth to keep morals." According to
the crosstab of
The variable SLVPBS measures respondents' views about the importance of preserving social
order. Based on the crosstab of
Respondents were also asked whether they agreed or disagreed that "if you start trying to
change things very much, you usually make them worse." The crosstab of
Are these attitudes reflected in respondents' stated willingness to demonstrate for
various causes? Let us take a look at the results of
Think about your answers to the application questions before you click through to the interpretation guide for help in answering them.
What percentage of Generation 3 respondents agreed that "solving social problems is more important than law and order"? How did older generations feel about this issue?
Things to think about in interpreting the results:
Reading the results:
The goal of this exercise was to explore the differential impact of the events of the 1950-60s on three generations of Americans. Taken together, the results show that social change affects people of different ages differently. Young people in this 1971 survey appeared more alienated than their parents and grandparents, and somewhat less sure of where the normative boundaries are. They were more likely to be confident about their ability to control their lives, but more doubtful that they can influence government. Their attitudes toward the women's liberation ideas, civil rights and social order suggest a greater awareness of the inequalities in American society and a belief that these could and should be changed by individual and collective action.
Further research might explore whether geographical location mediates the effects of social change.