James D. Orcutt

Shocking Numbers and Graphic Accounts: Quantified Images of Drug Problems in the Print Media

This paper examines how journalists and graphic artists in the national print media used statistical results from annual surveys of student drug use to construct quantified claims about a cocaine epidemic and other drug problems in 1986 and in subsequent years. Editorial and creative decisions entailed in transforming modest yearly changes in time-series data into a dramatic graphic image of “a coke plague” early in 1986 are reconstructed. The changing character of quantified images in the print media during the summer and fall of 1986 provides additional insights into how the rise and decline of a media “feeding frenzy” altered the claims-making activity of media workers. Finally, a recent case of the construction of a “new” drug problem on the eroding foundation of the cocaine epidemic is presented. The paper concludes with a discussion of how competitive conditions in the journalistic arena affect the production and distortion of quantified images of drug problems.

Contrasting Effects of Two Kinds of Boredom on Alcohol Use

Despite its prominence among common sense explanations of alcohol use and drinking problems, the phenomenon of boredom has received remarkably little attention among alcohol researchers. This study focuses on two distinctive kinds of boredom identified in an earlier survey and relates them to drinking behavior in a student sample. A scale of Existential Boredom (e.g., frequency of boredom, a lack of purpose in life) was found in multiple regression analyses to have a strong, positive relationship to frequency of alcohol use among males. A scale measuring Interpersonal Boredom (e.g., boredom with “small talk” versus feelings of “happiness with people”) was inversely related to quantity of alcohol consumed by both males and females. These and other findings suggest that the mundane situational experience of boredom has important consequences that are worthy of further sociological investigation.

Normative Definitions of Intoxicated States: A Test of Several Sociological Theories

Several sociological theories of intoxication propose that positive outcomes (getting “high”) and negative outcomes (“bad trips”) of recreational drug use are influenced by cultural expectations learned through group interaction. Respondents in this study rated the expected probability of various outcomes of marijuana or alcohol intoxication. As predicted, the greater the number of ones friends who use a drug, the lower the expected probability of negative outcomes, even after statistical controls for ones own use and for quantity of personal use are introduced. For marijuana, but not for alcohol, the expected probability of positive outcomes is directly related to the number of friends who use it. The results generally support sociological explanations of intoxicated states, but also point to some pharmacological influences in the case of alcohol.

Human-computer relationships: Interactions and attitudes

An exploratory study of human-computer relationships is reported which utilizes gaming techniques. Attention is given to the conceptualization and measurement of human reactions and interactions; an attempt is made to investigate differentials between human-human and human-computer relationships.

Conflicting testimony: Judges' and attorneys' perceptions of gender bias in legal settings

Statewide samples of women judges (N = 40), men judges (N = 326), women attorneys (N = 414), men attorneys (N = 288) in Florida rated the extent to which judges and attorneys of both genders engage in different forms of biased behavior against women in legal settings. Women judges and attorneys are most aware of gender-biased behavior against women. Women judges differ, especially, from men judges in perceiving other judges as behaving unprofessionally toward women. Multiple regression results show that this “gender gap” in perceptions is partly a function of age. This study suggests that promotion of more women to judgeships and educational efforts aimed at the younger generation of men judges will be productive in reducing biased treatment of women in the legal system.

Recreational Effects of Marijuana and Alcohol: Some Descriptive Dimensions

Effect-orientation and relaxation are singled out as potentially useful concepts for social research on the recreational effects of marijuana and alcohol. Factor analyses of questionnaire data from a large study of marijuana and alcohol users reveal that these concepts coherently describe independent dimensions of recreational effects. Relaxation is generally characteristic of the effects of both drugs, but the effect-orientations of marijuana and alcohol differ considerably. The effects of both drugs change predictably along the two dimensions as drug-using situations change. These findings are related to important problems for further social research on recreational drug effects.

Student Protest and Sex-Role Attitude Change, 1967-1971: A Log-Linear Analysis of Longitudinal Data.

Longitudinal relationships between protest participation and attitude toward the female role are examined in data from a 1967–1971 national panel of college students using Goodmans log-linear techniques for the analysis of two-attribute turnover tables. Contrary to earlier evidence, 1967 protest participation does not predict 1971 sex-role “modernism” for either females or males. Sex-role modernism in 1967 does predict protest participation by 1971. No evidence is found for expected three-variable interactions involving gender, sex-role attitude, and protest participation. These findings suggest a need for reinterpretation of earlier work relating student protest to the sex-role attitudes of college women.

Perceived Risks of Marijuana and Alcohol Use: Comparisons of Non-Users and Regular Users

Survey data on various risks attributed to drug use are analyzed through two-way comparisons of non-users and regular users of marijuana and alcohol. For both drugs, non-users perceive considerably greater risk in use than do regular users. For most kinds of drug-related risks, alcohol use is perceived as involving the same or greater degrees of risk than is marijuana use. The findings suggest that young people will not attach a great deal of credibility to propaganda emphasizing the risks of marijuana use.

Book Review: The Drinking ManThe Drinking Man. By McClellandDavid C., DavisWilliam N., KalinRudolf, and WannerEricNew York:The Free Press, 1972. 402 pp.

Even as the disease model of alcoholism is finally gaining a foothold with the general public, many social scientists in the field of alcohol studies have become increasingly skeptical of the sharp discontinuity between normal and pathological drinking implied by that conception. This healthy skepticism will be further encouraged by The Drinking Man. The product of ten years of cumulative investigation by David MeClelland and his associates, this book centers around a search for the motivations which lead Everyman, as well as The Drunkard, to seek the pleasures of alcohol. The results of this search will be of great interest to researchers and practitioners specifically concerned with the problem of alcoholism, but the findings of The Drinking Man are also relevant to a broader range of drinking behavior. Although the series of studies reported in this volume is guided by a common premise-that alcoholism is essentially a psychologically motivated act-a diverse array of methodological strategies is employed by the authors to explore the motivational contexts of alcohol use. As in earlier research conducted by McClelland and his associates, the .Thematic Apperception Test functions as the basic measure of fantasy and motivational variables in many of these studies. However, the authors also make effective and imaginative use of numerous other techniques, most notably computerized content analysis of anthropological materials and experimental designs in natural drinking settings. The substantive conclusions of the book are strengthened considerably by the wide scope and variety of evidence which this multifaceted approach brings to bear on the central issue of drinkingand motivation. The authors conclude that mans thirst for alcohol is motivated primarily by his thirst for power. With regard to both power and alcohol, however, some men thirst more and in different ways than do others. Heavy drinkers are found to have a greater overall concern with power than do moderate drinkers. Furthermore, the power needs of the heavy drinker are colored by an impulsive and egoistic quality termed Book reviews