Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T13:20:37.288Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Durkheim, Booth and Yule: the non-diffusion of an intellectual innovation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Get access

Extract

Except perhaps for a few diehards, no sociologist today would think of conducting a large-scale empirical investigation of numerical data without a firm grasp of statistical methods—or at least a graduate assistant who has such a grasp. The old polemics about statistics in social research have died away and are now lost to view under a blizzard of statistical findings in journal articles and books. Asked to date the period when statistical analysis really ‘took over’ in social research, most sociologists would probably put the date around i960, when large computers and efficient programs became widely available. But the date of widespread adoption is perhaps not as significant as the date on which the leaders in the field became convinced of the desirability of using powerful statistical methods in the analysis of standardized data.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Archives Européenes de Sociology 1976

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Booth, , Charles, et al. , Life and Labour of the People in London (London, Macmillan, 19021903 [1st ed. 1889–1891]), 17 vols.Google Scholar
Boudon, , Raymond, , Vanalyse mathimathique des faits sociaux (Paris, Plon, 1970).Google Scholar
Clark, Terry N., Durkheim, Éimile and the French University: the institutionalization of sociology, in Oberschall, Anthony, The Establishment of Empirical Sociology (New York, Harper and Row, 1972), pp. 152186.Google Scholar
Clark, , Terry, N., Prophets and Patrons the French university and the emergence of social science (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1973).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Durkheim, , Éimile, , Suicide: a study in sociology (Glencoe, 111., Free Press, 1951 [1st ed. 1897]).Google Scholar
Durkheim, , Éimile, , Suicide et natalité: étude de statistique morale, Revue philosophique, XXVI (1888), 446–63.Google Scholar
Katz, , Elihu, , Levin, , Martin, L. and Hamilton, , Herbert, , Traditions of Research on the Diffusion of Innovation, American Sociological Review, XXVIII (1963), 237252.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kendall, M.G., The History of Statistical Methods, International Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences XV (New York, Macmillan/Free Press, 1968), pp. 224232. Quoted as 1968a.Google Scholar
Kendall, M.G., Yule, G. Udney, International Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences XVI (New YorkMacmillan/Free Press, 1968). Quoted as 1968b.Google Scholar
Koren, , John, , The History of Statistics (New York, Macmillan, 1918).Google Scholar
Lazarsfeld, , Paul, F., Notes on the History of Quantification in Sociology—Trends, sources and problems, in Woolf, Harry (ed.), Quantification: a history of the meaning of measurement in the natural and social sciences (Indianapolis, Ind., Bobbs-Merrill, 1961), pp. 147203.Google Scholar
Lazarsfeld, , Paul, F., The Analysis of Attribute Data, International Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences XV (New York, Macmillan/Free Press, 1968), 419429.Google Scholar
Lazarsfeld, , Paul, F. and Oberschall, , Anthony, , Weber, Max and Empirical Social Research, American Sociological Review, XXX (1965), 185199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
LÉCUYER, , Bernard, and Oberschall, , Anthony, R., The Early History of Social Research, International Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences XV (New York, Macmillan/ Free Press, 1968), pp. 3653.Google Scholar
Lukes, , Steven, , Smile Durkheim: his life and work (New York, Harper and Row, 1972).Google Scholar
Merton, , Robert, K., Fact and Fectitiousness in Ethnic Opinionnaires, American Sociological Review, V (1940), 1328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morselli, , Enrico, , Suicide (New York, Appleton, 1882 [1st ed. 1879]).Google Scholar
Oberschall, , Anthony, , Empirical Social Research in Germany: 1848–1914 (The Hague, Mouton, 1965).Google Scholar
Peyre, , Henri, , Durkheim, : the man, his time, and his intellectual background, in Wolff, Kurt H. (ed.), Smile Durkheim, 1858–1917 (Columbus, Ohio State University Press, 1960), pp. 331.Google Scholar
Selvin, , Hanan, C., Durkheim, 's Suicide and Problems of Empirical Research, American Journal of Sociology, LXIII (1958), 607–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Selvin, , Hanan, C., Durkheim, 's Suicide further thoughts on a methodological classic, in Nisbet, Robert A. (ed.), Smile Durkheim (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice Hall, 1965), pp. 113136.Google Scholar
Selvin, , Hanan, C., On Formalizing Theory, in Coser, Lewis (ed.), The Idea of Social Structure: papers in honor of Robert K. Merton (New York, Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1975).Google Scholar
Semmel, , Bernard, , Pearson, Karl: socialist and Darwinist, British Journal of Sociology, IX (1958), 111125.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simey, T.S. and Simey, M.B., Charles Booth (London, Oxford University Press, 1960).Google Scholar
Stouffer, , Samuel, A., Social Research to Test Ideas (New York, Free Press of Glencoe, 1962).Google Scholar
Weber, , Max, , Gesammelte Aufsdtze zur Wissenschaftslehrel (Tubingen, Siebeck, 1951), I: Roscher und Knies und die logischen Probleme der historischen Nationaloekonomie, p. 68.Google Scholar
Yule, , Udny, G., On the Correlation of Total Pauperism with Proportion of Outrelief, Economic Journal, V (1895), 477489.Google Scholar
Yule, , Udny, G., On the Significance of Bravais, Formulae for Regression, and e., in the Case of Skew Correlation, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, LX (1897), 477489.Google Scholar
Yule, , Udny, G., An Investigation into the Causes of Changes in Pauperism in England, chiefly during the last two intercensal decades. Part I, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, LXII (1899), 249286.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yule, , Udny, G., On the Association of Attributes in Statistics: with illustrations from the material of the Childhood Society, etc., Philosophical Transactions [Royal Society of London] Series A CLXXXXIV (1900), 257319.Google Scholar
Yule, , Udny, G. and Kendall, M.G., An Introduction to the Theory of Statistics, 14th edition revised and enlarged (London, Griffin, 1969 [1st ed. 1911]). — M. G. Kendall has been a joint author since the 11th edition (1937): the 1958 edition was revised by Kendall.Google Scholar