Leonard W. Doob

Risk and Benefit Perceptions, Acceptability Judgments, and Self-Reported Actions toward Nuclear Power

Summary Three-hundred and sixty-seven respondents selected from five widely differing groups in two U.S. communities were administered a questionnaire tapping personal action for or against nuclear power, as well as a variety of attitudinal, cognitive, and sociodemographic variables. Respondents included members of environmental groups, college students, blue-collar workers, business people, and nuclear engineers and other technologists. The results indicated that degree of self-reported action was systematically correlated with the rated “acceptability,” risks, benefits, and qualitative characteristics of nuclear power. The results also pointed to other major correlates of personal action, including confidence in various risk-management institutions and organizations. Emphasis is placed upon general methodological issues involved in the study of risk perceptions, acceptability judgments, and actions.

A Cyprus Workshop: An Exercise in Intervention Methodology

Summary A detailed, personalized report is provided concerning the data gathered to determine whether a workship planned for Greek and Turkish Cypriotes was feasible and desirable, to formulate the goals of the enterprise, actually to recruit participants, and to ascertain some of the opinions and attitudes likely to be expressed during that workshop. The data could not be utilized, however, because a few days before the participants were to gather in Northern Italy the government of the Greek community on the island was overthrown and five days later an invasion by the Turks began. The emphasis is upon the clinical or practical experience gained from this aborted attempt, which might be useful in future enterprises.

The Impact of a Workshop upon Grass-Roots Leaders in Belfast

Nine months after 56 persons from the various communities of Belfast had attended a modified Tavistock-NTL Workshop in Scotland, 40 of them were interviewed to determine the effect of that experience. Emphasis was placed upon the changes they had observed within themselves, upon the organizations they had planned during the Workshop, and upon their own general effectiveness back in Belfast. The results are not clear-cut, but for everyone the Workshop itself was an impressive event. Many reported that they had been helped as persons. For some but not all participants the Workshop facilitated elaboration or subsequent carrying out of plans of their own devising in spite of intimidation and of the difficulties inherent within Northern Ireland.

Cypriot Patriotism and Nationalism

Most Cypriots before and since independence in 1960 experienced a double patriotism that contributed to the prolongation of the conflict between the two communities in their country. They identified with the island on which they lived as well as with the nation, Greece or Turkey, from which their ancestors had come. These patriotisms changed after the landing of the Turkish troops in 1974 when Cyprus was split into two distinct sections clearly based upon Turkish and Greek ethnicity. An attempt is made here to describe the resulting insecurity that played a significant role in preventing a resolution of the conflict in 1984-1985. For inductive, theoretical reasons a deliberate effort is also made to isolate ensuing “consequences” and hence to salvage old and slightly new generalizations that perhaps transcend this particular conflict.

Rationale, Research, and Role Relations in the Stirling Workshop

Criticisms of theory, design, and research connected with a workshop involving Catholics and Protestants from Belfast are assessed by the organizers and consultants responsible for the project. Differences in role and commitment are advanced as partial explanations for divergent assessments of the workshop.

Sustainable People: Hypotheses and a Call for Publishable Research

Abstract In various theoretical and applied disciplines ranging from forestry and medicine to politics and ethics, emphasis is currently being placed on what is called sustainability. To achieve sustainability in these spheres of human activity, people who are directly or indirectly involved need to possess certain attributes, five of which are tentatively postulated as follows: (a) the ability and patience to renounce present gains for those in the future; (b) adequate and relevant knowledge concerning the problems at hand; (c) aesthetic and moral feelings regarding people and their environments; (d) an internal rather than an external orientation, indicating that to some degree human existence can be controlled; and (e) the organization of such attributes in perspective. The Journal of Social Psychology seeks to encourage other efforts to specify the attributes of sustainable people. Articles will be assessed that deal with the theme either by summarizing and coordinating existing studies or by providin...

The Analysis and Resolution of International Disputes

Summary The principal aim of this paper is to summarize the best ideas emerging during an informal workshop in which sophisticated scholars and practitioners participated in an effort to identify and appraise possible new approaches to analyzing and resolving international disputes. The results are outlined in terms of the analyses and descriptions of such disputes; the measures that might be taken before, during, and after the disputes have arisen; and some of the methodological problems that arise. These diverse, heterogeneous materials can be tentatively synthesized, it is argued, by postulating the ideal attributes of a Homo Pacificus.

SOUTH TYROL: AN INTRODUCTION TO THE PSYCHOLOGICAL SYNDROME OF NATIONALISM

Historians, political scientists, and psychologists share with men of affairs a common interest in nationalism, especially in its manifestations around the world today. Here is a discussion of a psychologists approach to a study of nationalism in a particular locale. Leonard W. Doob is Professor of Psychology and Chairman of African studies at Yale University and a long-time student of attitudes and public opinion.

Avoiding an Impression of Ethno-and Egocentrism

Abstract Authors who submit for publication in psychology journals that lean toward general social science are encouraged to follow the simple rules herein explained to avoid the stylistic faults of ethnocentrism and egocentrism. The first fault gives a misleading or confused impression concerning the generalizability of the findings in a study. The second fault wastes space and is a harmless form of exhibitionism. Both faults can and should be eschewed.