Craig R. Humphrey

Attitudes and Conditions for Cooperation in a Paper Recycling Program

Receptivity toward paper recycling was examined in relation to peoples accuracy with wastepaper separation among: (1) personnel with two wastebaskets in offices, (2) personnel with divided wastebaskets, (3) personnel depositing nonsalvageable waste outside offices. A large university was used for the research, and half of each study group received encouragement to cooperate throughout this experiment. Findings indicated that receptivity and accuracy in wastepaper separation were related positively, but separation was better where the required effort was minimal, as in offices with two wastebaskets. Peoples accuracy with wastepaper separation deteriorated over time, but not enough to nullify the effect of asking people to participate in a paper recycling program. Encouragement did not have a statistically significant impact on accuracy with separation. Finally, no change in receptivity toward manual wastepaper separation was found among participants after the experiment. Therefore, the investigators concluded that office workers are willing and able to cooperate in paper recycling, though more needs to be known about improving peoples accuracy in manual wastepaper separation.

The rock, the beach, and the tidal pool: People and poverty in natural resource‐dependent areas

Abstract Explaining why poverty exists in natural resource‐dependent areas (NRDAs) presents a formidable challenge, given variability in the nature, spatial manifestations, and social character of human well‐being. Nonetheless, there are structures and processes unique to NRDAs, including resource degradation, increasingly restrictive public land use policies, concentrated land ownership, and high rates of occupational injury that create the potential for impoverization in NRDAs. Given this complex context, we examine two theories of poverty. We find processes such as the shift from labor to capital‐intensive resource extraction, profit squeezes, and increased capital mobility identified in advanced capitalism theory help to explain NRDA poverty. In addition, processes identified in the theory of internal colonialism such as unequal exchange, the clash between traditional and secular cultures, and the control of public agencies by powerful private interests are more basic forces in creating NRDA poverty.

Using Key Informant Data in Comparative Community Research

Among the obstacles confronting community researchers are difficulties in conducting comparative research involving more than a small number of communities. This is especially true when research is directed toward investigations of social processes and actions that cannot reasonably be tapped using available secondary data sources. One potential approach to resolving this dilemma involves the collection of information on social processes and actions in communities from knowledgeable “key informants.” However, despite the fact that use of informants has become relatively common in community research, little attention has been directed to the specific strengths and weaknesses of such data collection procedures. Issues of validity and reliability of informant-based data have not been widely discussed, and there have been few attempts to assess or compare various informant selection criteria. In this article we focus on an empirical overview of the key informant method and the data it can generate. The analysis is based on data collected in conjunction with a study of growth mobilization processes in small urban places. Our findings provide mixed evidence regarding the contention that use of multiple informants from each study unit can provide reliable and valid data on community processes.

Gender, Environmentalism, and Interest in Forest Certification: Mohai's Paradox Revisited

This research corroborates work by Mohai (1992) and others showing a consistent gender difference in environmental concern favoring women. It also helps resolve a paradox that women show more environmental concern than men, but they are less environmentally active. Using data from a survey of U.S. homeowners completed in 1994, we again find women more environmentally concerned than men. However, when green consumerism, rather than membership in environmental organizations, is used as an indicator of environmentalism (the dependent variable), women tend to be more environmentally active than men.

Industrial Development Groups, External Connections, and Job Generation in Local Communities

Local industrial development groups have grown rapidly in numbers and visibility around the nation as communities seek to promote economic development. The external connections of these groups include the network of contacts among local development groups and other organizations with a stake in industry vitality and economic prosperity in a community or region. Using survey data from directors of industrial development groups in 20 states, we test the hypothesis that growth promotion groups that actively maintain extensive connections are more successful in generating new jobs than more isolated organizations. Our findings provide evidence of the importance of external connections in community job creation while controlling for numerous other factors internal to the local industrial development groups themselves and several location features.

Sociology and the Environment: An Analysis of Coverage in Introductory Sociology Textbooks

Using content analysis, this research examines the impact of the first 25 years of environmental sociology research on current introductory sociology textbooks. The investigators searched the texts for 40 key concepts in environmental sociology and for the inclusion of works by 20 award-winning environmental sociologists. On average, the texts cited 7 of the 40 key concepts. Eliminating multiple citations to a page, the total number of pages cited averaged just under three percent per book. On average, the texts cite four works by influential environmental sociologists. The texts, however, omitted some of the most central, unique concepts in the field. The texts typically treated environmental issues as social problems rather than as the by-products of institutionalized behaviors or practices. There tends to be a positive relationship between the sales of a text and the discussion of the environment.

Disarming the War of the Growth Machines: A Panel Study

Intercommunity variation in growth machine activities, including the manipulation of the business climate and vertical integration with state economic development programs, net migration, and land use change are examined using a sample of 96 small urban places. A panel design and key informant methodology, 1970–90, permit cross-sectional and longitudinal observation. Using regression analysis with appropriate statistical controls, the research indicates that growth machines, particularly those in affluent communities, do intensify land uses. The business climate also negatively affects changes in business and industrial land uses as well as net migration. Some local efforts may not affect growth until the subsequent decade. The research suggests that growth machine activities are intensifying and may be exacerbating social inequality between places, especially affluent residential communities and declining working-class communities in the old industrial belt.

Public accountability in non-profit industrial development organisations

Non-profit industrial development organisations (NIDOs) represent a common but little studied community response to widespread deindustrialisation in the United States. These non-profits are organised as chartered not-for-profit corporations, public authorities or agencies of local government. Most receive at least some public funding to promote local industrial development. Thus, a key issue is how accountable NIDOs are to the public they have been created to serve. Data from national surveys of NIDO executive directors in 1984 and 1994, as well as a survey of six case study boards of directors, suggest that public accountability is an increasingly important concern among NIDOs. Public hearings, efforts to diversify the boards in terms of gender and race, and connections to community development corporations and other local organisations are among the ways NIDOs attempt to be accountable to the general public. Although few women or racial minorities serve on NIDO boards, those boards with representation of these groups tend to be more concerned with public accountability. Boards containing public officials tend to be less concerned, presumably because their presence makes the NIDOs more directly accountable as a result of the participation of elected public representatives.

Sociological Aspects of Waste Paper Recovery

Environmental managers in the business of designing solid waste management systems have a great need for sociological information about those who discard waste. This paper summarizes the literature on attitudinal and behavioral aspects of waste paper recovery, specifically looking for conditions under which attitudes and behavior were congruent. Attitudebehavior congruence is a pertinent sociological concern for the environmental manager, because conservation-oriented attitudes do not necessarily lead to conservation-oriented behavior. Only one study was uncovered about waste paper recovery where the relationship between attitudes and behavior was directly observed; it suggested that anti-litter attitudes and behavior were consistent. Other research has suggested hypothetical conditions which may contribute to a high congruence between attitudes and behavior. These conditions include personal cost, knowledge, and adequate storage space for separated categories of waste paper. Studies on behavioral prompting and reinforcement of waste paper recovery have indicated that without individual or group incentives, conservation-oriented behavior is relatively unlikely to be prevalent in American society, regardless of attitudes toward this kind of activity.

A multidisciplinary assessment of waste paper recovery from an institutional source

Abstract A multidisciplinary study of waste paper recovery from a complex of state government office buildings was undertaken for the purpose of developing, evaluating and recommending cost-reducing modifications in the present operations. Previous research on resource recovery has focused on either the total mixed municipal stream or specific residual materials within that stream. Little work has investigated the recycling potential of wastes from a particular institution such as state government which generates a considerable volume of waste paper. A major thrust of this research was a survey of the office workers and custodians who must participate in a waste paper recycling program. The economic viability of waste paper recovery programs is highly contingent on voluntary willingness of office workers to sort reclaimable residuals at the point of discard. This study demonstrated that office workers were receptive to recycling program, but that mere receptivity could not guarantee a successful program unless the participants were adequately advised on how to make distinctions between salvageable and nonsalvageable materials. Reluctance to support any administrative role change was found among custodial workers. This study also illustrated the financial advantages of manual separation at the source, as well as the impact of central storage and other modifications on the economics of the present system.