BIOLOGY AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES

Abstract. The sciences may be conceptualized as a hierarchy ranked by level of organization (e.g., many-body physics ranks above particle physics). Each science serves as an antidiscipline for the science above it; that is, between each pair, tense but creative interplay is inevitable. Biology has advanced through such tension between its subdisciplines and now can serve as an antidiscipline for the social sciences—for anthropology, for example, by examining the connection between cultural and biological evolution; for psychology, by addressing the nature of learning and the structure of the unconscious; for economics, by examining economically irrational behavior and by comparing economic activity in humans and other species. Sociology, concerned mainly with advanced literate societies, is relatively remote from the genetic basis of human social behavior. However, moving between biological and social levels of organization generates richness and points to new and unexpected principles.     

Medicine as business and profession

This paper analyzes one dimension of the frequently alleged contradiction between treating medicine as a business and as a profession, namely the incompatibility between viewing the physician patient relationship in economic and moral terms. The paper explores the utilitarian foundations of economics and the deontological foundations of professional medical ethics as one source for the business/medicine conflict that influences beliefs about the proper understanding of the therapeutic relationship. It, then, focuses on the contrast and distinction between medicine as business and profession by critically analyzing the classic economic view of the moral status of medicine articulated by Kenneth Arrow. The paper concludes with a discussion of some advantages associated with regarding medicine as a business.     

Use and misuse of metrics in research evaluation

This paper addresses some critical issues in the applicability of quantitative performance measures (including bibliometric, economic, and co-occurrence measures) to the assessment of basic research. The strengths and weaknesses of metrics applied as research performance measures are examined. It is concluded that metrics have a useful role to play in the evaluation of research. Each metric employed, whether bibliometric, economic, co-occurrence, or others, brings a new dimension of potential insight to the complex problem of research assessment. However, when used in a stand-alone mode, metrics can be easily misinterpreted and result in misleading conclusions. Metrics should be an integral part of a more comprehensive approach to research evaluation, in which the leading role is assumed by expert peer review. Under this structure, the reviewers must be broadly constituted, so that the technical correctness of the research approaches being taken (doing the job right) can be evaluated by technical experts and the correctness of the research target (doing the right job) can be evaluated as well. This comprehensive approach insures quality in the implementation of existing research paradigms and allows the introduction of revolutionary new research paradigms as well. The views contained in this paper are solely those of the author and do not represent the views of the Department of the Navy. Ronald Kostoff received a Ph.D. from Princeton University, performed technical and economic research at Bell Laboratories, managed energy programs at U.S. Department of Energy, was Director of Technical Assessment at the Office of Naval Research for many years and presently manages the Navy’s In-House Laboratory Independent Research Program.     

不患不均？容忍和支持经济不平等的心理学解释

不断加剧的经济不平等问题对个体和社会有着巨大危害,然而人们对经济不平等却有着较高的容忍性。基于个体心理的研究证据,本文提出认知和动机双重路径模型来解释个体容忍和支持经济不平等问题。在认知路径上,个体倾向于低估当前社会的经济不平等程度和将经济不平等评价为公平的;在动机路径上,个体预期经济不平等将带来自我利益的增加。未来研究应进一步整合多重心理机制间的关系,并探索有效干预手段以增加人们对减少经济不平等的支持。     

经济不平等对阶层流动感知的影响及其机制

经济不平等是影响阶层流动感知的重要因素。研究发现,经济不平等可能抑制、也可能提升阶层流动感知。在梳理两者之间复杂关系的基础上,本文提出了经济不平等影响阶层流动感知的作用机制模型。经济不平等可能通过影响不同的心理过程,继而对阶层流动感知产生抑制或提升作用;此外,两者关系也会受到微观个体因素和宏观社会因素的调节,从而呈现出不同的关系模式。未来研究应进一步考察和完善经济不平等影响阶层流动感知的整合模型。     

Use of newsletters to promote environmental political action: an experimental analysis

The managers of beach businesses were randomly assigned to receive no intervention or two newsletters per week for 6 weeks that presented economic consequences of damage to coastal water quality and how to contact politicians. The percentage of proenvironmental political contacts was significantly greater in the experimental (newsletter) group than in the control group. Logistical regression showed that contacts in the newsletter group were more than five times that of controls after adjusting for history of contacts and predisposition to take such action. Results suggest that the intervention can promote political action that could influence environmental policies and human health.     

Emancipatory responses to oppression: the template of land-use planning and the Old Order Amish of Ontario

In this paper I discuss the clash of values between the Old Order Amish community of Ontario and the dominant social paradigm in agriculture. Land-use and agricultural regulations, designed for an industrial style of agriculture, are experienced as a threat to the survival of the Old Order Amish agricultural social economy and community. The paper describes how I have worked with the Old Order Amish to respond to these challenges and to create public policies that will allow them to maintain their human and agricultural diversity and small-scale sustainable farm practices. Four case studies illuminating the oppressive land-use regulations along with the emancipatory responses to the oppression are examined. The social transformation themes include principles and processes for community psychologists, land-use planners, and community economic development practitioners to consider. The article has heuristic value for a practice-based approach to social change.     

The psychological sense of economic hardship: measurement models, validity, and cross-ethnic equivalence for urban families

Poverty is a community stressor that disproportionally affects ethnic minority families. One aspect of programmatic research on poverty focuses on the psychological sense of economic hardship. In a study of 319 African American, European American, and Mexican American urban families, parents completed objective measures of economic status and scales of perceived economic hardship that were adapted from previous research. Measurement models identified a coherent construct of psychological sense of economic hardship that was essentially equivalent for mothers and fathers, English- and Spanish-speaking Mexican Americans, and the 3 ethnic groups. In support of the validity of this construct, relations between objective indicators of economic status and perceived economic hardship showed equivalence across these same groups.     

Pathways of Economic Influence on Adolescent Adjustment

An important part of a science aimed at the prevention of human dysfunction involves the development of empirically based models that identify processes of risk for or protection from emotional distress or behavioral problems over time. The present study developed and evaluated such a model that proposed two pathways through which family economic pressure was expected to influence change in adolescent internalizing symptoms (depression and anxiety) during the period from the eighth to the tenth grades. A total of 377 rural families in a midwestern state provided data for the analyses. The results were generally consistent with the conceptual model in that family economic pressure increased adolescent perceptions of family economic hardship, which, in turn, reduced the adolescent's sense of control or mastery over time. Lowered mastery was associated with increases in emotional distress. Also consistent with the model, prior levels of mastery appeared to reduce the magnitude of economic stress experienced by the adolescent, whereas prior emotional distress intensified the economic stress process. Although gender differences were found in these processes, the overall pattern of results suggests that girls and boys are both at risk for internalizing problems when families experience economic pressure. Implicatios of the findings for the dvelopment of effective preventive interventions with financially stressed families in rural areas are discussed.     

伊斯兰经济思想特点及其基本精神

经济是推动人类社会发展的基础,没有经济的发展就没有社会的进步,就没有人们生活水平的改善和提高。伊斯兰教作为一个提倡今世与后世并重的宗教,历来就重视穆斯林经济的发展,其思想体系包括宗教与社会两大范畴,不仅对宗教教义、宗教功课、宗教仪规等方面作了明确的阐释与规定,而且对人们在社会生活中(包括经济生活)的思想和行为提出了明确的规范和要求。