Institute of Social Research

In November 1965 the first Scientific Research Institute for Complex Social Research in the country was organized at the A. A. Zhdanov Leningrad State University. It is made up of eight laboratories: Social-Economic Research (director, V. R. Polozov), Sociological Research (director, V. A. Yadov), Engineering Psychology (director, B. F. Lomov), Differential Psychology and Anthropology (director, acting member of the RSFSR Academy of Pedagogical Sciences B. G. Anan'yev), Social Psychology (director, Ye. S. Kuz'min), Legal Research (director, corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences D. A. Kerimov), Programmed Instruction (director, A. F. Esaulov), Efficient Management in Work Collectives (director, L. L. Gremyako).     

From Positivism to Interpretivism and Beyond: Tales of Transformation in Educational and Social Research

From Positivism to Interpretivism and Beyond: Tales of Transformation in Educational and Social Research. Louis Heshusius and Keith Ballard, eds. New York: Teachers College Press, 1996. 197 pp.     

The Ethnographer's Eye: Ways of Seeing in Modern Anthropology: Visual Methods in Social Research

The Ethnographer's Eye: Ways of Seeing in Modern Anthropology. Anna Grimshaw. Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press, 2001. 222 pp.
Visual Methods in Social Research. Marcus Banks. New York City: Sage Publications, 2001. 201 pp.     

The Study of Social Structure.

The Study of Social Structure. M. G. Smith. New York: Research Institute for the Study of Man, 1998. 246 pp.     

Social network size in humans

This paper examines social network size in contemporary Western society based on the exchange of Christmas cards. Maximum network size averaged 153.5 individuals, with a mean network size of 124.9 for those individuals explicitly contacted; these values are remarkably close to the group size of 150 predicted for humans on the basis of the size of their neocortex. Age, household type, and the relationship to the individual influence network structure, although the proportion of kin remained relatively constant at around 21%. Frequency of contact between network members was primarily determined by two classes of variable: passive factors (distance, work colleague, overseas) and active factors (emotional closeness, genetic relatedness). Controlling for the influence of passive factors on contact rates allowed the hierarchical structure of human social groups to be delimited. These findings suggest that there may be cognitive constraints on network size. This project was funded by a grant from Hewlett Packard Research Laboratories (Bristol) and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The support of the ESRC is gratefully acknowledged. This work was part of the programme of the ESRC Research Centre for Economic Learning and Social Evolution (ELSE). Russell Hill (B.Sc., M.Phil, Ph.D.) is an Addison Wheeler Research Fellow at the University of Durham. His main research interests are in the evolution of mammalian social systems. Robin Dunbar (B.A., Ph.D.) is a professor of evolutionary psychology at the University of Liverpool. His research interests span mammalian behavioral ecology, including humans, cognitive mechanisms, and Darwinian psychology.     

Social Justice and Social Order: Binding Moralities across the Political Spectrum

Two studies explored the relationship between political ideology and endorsement of a range of moral principles. Political liberals and conservatives did not differ on intrapersonal or interpersonal moralities, which require self-regulation. However differences emerged on collective moralities, which involve social regulation. Contrary to Moral Foundations Theory, both liberals and conservatives endorsed a group-focused binding morality, specifically Social Justice and Social Order respectively. Libertarians were the group without a binding morality. Although Social Justice and Social Order appear conflictual, analyses based on earlier cross-cultural work on societal tightness-looseness suggest that countries actually benefit in terms of economic success and societal well-being when these group-based moralities co-exist and serve as counterweights in social regulation.     

Social networks strongly predict the gut microbiota of wild mice

The mammalian gut teems with microbes, yet how hosts acquire these symbionts remains poorly understood. Research in primates suggests that microbes can be picked up via social contact, but the role of social interactions in non-group-living species remains underexplored. Here, we use a passive tracking system to collect high resolution spatiotemporal activity data from wild mice (Apodemus sylvaticus). Social network analysis revealed social association strength to be the strongest predictor of microbiota similarity among individuals, controlling for factors including spatial proximity and kinship, which had far smaller or nonsignificant effects. This social effect was limited to interactions involving males (male-male and male-female), implicating sex-dependent behaviours as driving processes. Social network position also predicted microbiota richness, with well-connected individuals having the most diverse microbiotas. Overall, these findings suggest social contact provides a key transmission pathway for gut symbionts even in relatively asocial mammals, that strongly shapes the adult gut microbiota. This work underlines the potential for individuals to pick up beneficial symbionts as well as pathogens from social interactions.Subject terms: Microbial ecology, Zoology, Community ecology     

Old Age Assistance: A Report by the Bureau of Research and Planning

What are some of the reasons why older persons become eligible for Old Age Assistance in California?How many become eligible because of medical care needs?This Report of the Bureau of Research and Planning draws upon recently published data of the State Department of Social Welfare and presents statistics covering a recent one-year period.     

Creative Social Research: Rethinking Theories and Methods and the Calling of an Ontological Epistemology of Participation

Modern social research, as we know it now, emerged as a part of rise of modern social sciences in the context of transition to modernity. As an enterprise of modernity social research reflected some of the foundational assumptions of modernity. For example, the project of sociology was closely tied to the project of nation-state, embodying in its epistemology methodological nationalism. Social research also proceeded within the bounded logic of disciplines. But all these assumptions of modernity as well as their social manifestations have been subjected to fundamental criticisms and interrogations in the last decades. Both anti-systematic socio-cultural movements and critical discursive movements and new movements of ideas have challenged the modernist paradigms of pathology and normality as well as distinction between ontology and epistemology. In the background of critiques of modernity, social movements and processes of transformations the present essay submits some proposals for a creative and critical social research. It explores ways of moving beyond mere denunciations and critiques and embodying transformational theories and methods which would facilitate creative and critical research. The essay also calls for a new vocation of social research by pleading for a simultaneous engagement in activism and creative understanding, fieldwork and philosophical reflections, ontological self-cultivation and epistemic labour of learning. Ananta Kumar Giri originally from Madras Institute of Development Studies, Chennai, India is currently a Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at Institute of Sociology, Albert Ludwig Univesitat, Freiburg, Germany. The present essay builds upon author’s introduction to his recently edited volume, Creative Social Research: Rethinking Theories and Methods (Lanham, MD, USA: Lexington Books, 2004 & New Delhi. Sage, 2004. This has benefited from presentations in many different places, most recently at the Ernest Gellenr seminar series in Prague and Institute of Sociology, Freiburg, and my grateful to thanks are due to participants in all these places of dialogues, particularly to Professors Chitta Ranjan Das , Peter Skalnik and Hermann Shwengel.     

The challenge of health care provision: A case study from Mexico

Lorenza Menegoni has a doctorate in Anthropology from the Graduate Faculty, The New School for Social Research, New York City. She is continuing her research in Mexico. Carmen Hendershott has a doctorate in Anthropology from the Graduate Faculty, The New School for Social Research, where she is working as a research librarian.     

Social neuroscience and its potential contribution to psychiatry

Most mental disorders involve disruptions of normal social behavior. Social neuroscience is an interdisciplinary field devoted to understanding the biological systems underlying social processes and behavior, and the influence of the social environment on biological processes, health and well‐being. Research in this field has grown dramatically in recent years. Active areas of research include brain imaging studies in normal children and adults, animal models of social behavior, studies of stroke patients, imaging studies of psychiatric patients, and research on social determinants of peripheral neural, neuroendocrine and immunological processes. Although research in these areas is proceeding along largely independent trajectories, there is increasing evidence for connections across these trajectories. We focus here on the progress and potential of social neuroscience in psychiatry, including illustrative evidence for a rapid growth of neuroimaging and genetic studies of mental disorders. We also argue that neuroimaging and genetic research focused on specific component processes underlying social living is needed.     

Social Suffering

Social Suffering. Arthur Kleinman. Veena Das. and Margaret Lock. eds. Berkeley. University of California Press, 1997. 404 pp.     

Social buffering: relief from stress and anxiety

Communication is essential to members of a society not only for the expression of personal information, but also for the protection from environmental threats. Highly social mammals have a distinct characteristic: when conspecific animals are together, they show a better recovery from experiences of distress. This phenomenon, termed 'social buffering', has been found in rodents, birds, non-human primates and also in humans. This paper reviews classical findings on social buffering and focuses, in particular, on social buffering effects in relation to neuroendocrine stress responses. The social cues that transmit social buffering signals, the neural mechanisms of social buffering and a partner's efficacy with respect to social buffering are also detailed. Social contact appears to have a very positive influence on the psychological and the physiological aspects of social animals, including human beings. Research leading towards further understanding of the mechanisms of social buffering could provide alternative medical treatments based on the natural, individual characteristics of social animals, which could improve the quality of life.     

On the History of British Social Anthropology

After Tylor: British Social Anthropology 1888-1951. George W. Stocking Jr. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995.570 pp.
The Expansive Moment: The Rise of Social Anthropology in Britain and Africa 1918-1970. Jack Goody. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 238 pp.     

Bioethics in Social Context

Bioethics in Social Context. Barry Hoffmaster. ed. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2001.vii. 234 pp.     

Foundations of Social Inequality

Foundations of Social Inequality. T. Douglas Price and Gary M. Feinman. eds. New York: Plenum Press, 1995. 290 pp.     

A one-eyed gaze: Gender in 19th century illustration of Peru

Deborah Poole is Professor of Anthropology in the graduate faculty of The New School for Social Research.     

Social phobia

Social anxiety disorder (social phobia) is an irrational fear of being observed and judged by other people in various social settings. The individual is afraid that he or she will act in a way that will be humiliating or embarrassing. It is often a chronic, disabling condition that is characterized by a phobic avoidance of most social situations. Social anxiety disorder is the most frequent anxiety disorder (10-15%) that occurs in two subtypes--generalized and specific. It is a disorder that occurs during the adolescence and reflects negatively to the quality of life of an individual. Neurobiological basis of this disorder has not been explored yet. The disorder is frequently burdened with comorbidity with other anxiety disorders, depression and substance-related disorders. Only cognitive-behavioral techniques are desirable in the psychotherapeutic treatment of the disorder and the best results are achieved in combination with pharmacotherapy. The medicaments of choice in the treatment of social anxiety disorder are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. Anxiolytics should be used only as a supplementary in the acute phase. Treatment of social anxiety disorder should last at least 3 months up to one year.     

Recasting the mode of production

Robert Briglio is a human-rights lawyer and a student of Anthropology at the New School for Social Research.