IsisCB Explore

Article ID: CBB446491433

The Plasticity of Social Knowledge: Paul F. Lazarsfeld and U.S. Communication Research, 1937–1952 (2023)

Time (Author)

Journal for the History of Knowledge
Volume: 4

URI: https://journalhistoryknowledge.org/article/view/11808

DOI: 10.55283/jhk.11808

Outside Links

WorldCat

Google Scholar

JSTOR

Academia.edu

Research methods Research institutes; research stations Sociology of knowledge Communication Social sciences Funding and finance 20th century United States Lazarsfeld, Paul F.

This article describes how the Austrian-American sociologist Paul F. Lazarsfeld and his Bureau of Applied Social Research applied a consistent bundle of findings—about the interplay of mass media and personal influence—to sharply different contexts. From the late 1930s through to the early 1950s, Lazarsfeld stressed a stable set of social-psychological conditions that complicate media persuasion, which, however, could still be effective if paired with face-to-face campaigns. He developed the claim, first, with the aim of promoting educational radio. At the outbreak of war in Europe, Lazarsfeld and the Bureau moved to apply the findings to domestic morale and propaganda. In the immediate postwar years, Lazarsfeld redirected the Bureau’s energies towards domestic-facing social problems, retrofitting his personal-influence framework to the promotion of peace and tolerance. With the Cold War, finally, Lazarsfeld reverted to a martial posture, as social progress gave sudden way to psychological warfare. Thus, the paper describes a four-stage seesaw pattern: persuasion for social ends in the first and third periods, succeeded in both cases by war service. The Bureau’s communication research in the century’s middle-third is, the paper argues, a case study in the plasticity of social knowledge—variation around a stable theme. What was pliable was the topical enclosure, dictated in the main by the sponsorship on offer. Before this article appeared in Volume 4 (2023), it had been published as 'online first' article on the website of Journal for the History of Knowledge on August 17, 2023. The article was not changed when it was published in the annual volume.

...More

Citation URI

https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB446491433/

Citations Indexes

Similar Citations

Chapter Morris, Norma; (2010)
Authority Relations as Condition for, and Outcome of, Shifts in Governance: The Limited Impact of the UK Research Assessment Exercise on the Biosciences (/isis/citation/CBB001420862/)

Book Gemelli, Giuliana; MacLeod, Roy M.; (2003)
American Foundations in Europe: Grant-Giving Policies, Cultural Diplomacy, and Trans-Atlantic Relations, 1920--1980 (/isis/citation/CBB001035780/)

Chapter Benninghoff, Martin; Braun, Dietmar; (2010)
Research Funding, Authority Relations, and Scientific Production in Switzerland (/isis/citation/CBB001420857/)

Chapter Gläser, Jochen; Lange, Stefan; Laudel, Grit; Schimank, Uwe; (2010)
The Limits of Universality: How Field-Specific Epistemic Conditions Affect Authority Relations and Their Consequences (/isis/citation/CBB001420864/)

Article Fengler, Silke; Luxbacher, Günther; (2011)
“Aufrechterhaltung der gemeinsamen Kultur.” Die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft und die Österreichisch-Deutsche Wissenschaftshilfe in der Zwischenkriegszeit (/isis/citation/CBB001220463/)

Book Orth, Karin; (2010)
Die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, 1920--1970: Forschungsförderung im Spannungsfeld von Wissenschaft und Politik (/isis/citation/CBB001036172/)

Book Orth, Karin; (2011)
Autonomie und Planung der Forschung Förderpolitische Strategien der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft 1949--1968 (/isis/citation/CBB001420959/)

Article Scheffler, Robin Wolfe; (2014)
Managing the Future: The Special Virus Leukemia Program and the Acceleration of Biomedical Research (/isis/citation/CBB001421647/)

Article Kasperson, Roger E.; (Fall 2012)
A Perspective on the Social Amplifications of Risk (/isis/citation/CBB771024272/)

Book Orth, Karin; Oberkrome, Willi; (2010)
Die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft 1920--1970: Forschungsförderung im Spannungsfeld von Wissenschaft und Politik (/isis/citation/CBB001023723/)

Chapter Wagner, Patrick; (2010)
Grenzwächter und Grenzgänger der Wissenschaft: Die Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft und die Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften, 1920--1970 (/isis/citation/CBB001036196/)

Article Rankin, William J.; (2009--2010)
The Epistemology of the Suburbs: Knowledge, Production, and Corporate Laboratory Design (/isis/citation/CBB001033584/)

Article Kerry Holden; (2015)
Lamenting the Golden Age: Love, Labour and Loss in the Collective Memory of Scientists (/isis/citation/CBB355666558/)

Article Antonio Di Meo; (2020)
Communicating Science: A Modern Event (/isis/citation/CBB151156196/)

Thesis Martin, Shirley Ann; (2012)
Grounding Tools That Travel: Ideology, Research Style, and Imagined Community in the Circulation of Inferential Statistics, 1918--1966 (/isis/citation/CBB001560742/)

Thesis Pooley, Jefferson D.; (2006)
An Accident of Memory: Edward Shils, Paul Lazarsfeld and the History ofAmerican Mass Communication Research (/isis/citation/CBB001561631/)

Book Denisse Vásquez-Guevara; Judith McIntosh White; David Weiss; Angélica Ochoa-Aviles; Fernando Ortiz-Vizuete; (2023)
Science Communication and Public Engagement: Evolving toward Science-Society Participation (/isis/citation/CBB589845986/)

Article Helena Bilandzic; Anja Kalch; Jens Soentgen; (August 2017)
Effects of Goal Framing and Emotions on Perceived Threat and Willingness to Sacrifice for Climate Change (/isis/citation/CBB518869455/)

Book Kat Jungnickel; (2020)
Transmissions: Critical Tactics for Making and Communicating Research (/isis/citation/CBB573090665/)

Thesis Eric Tapken Hounshell; (2017)
A Feel for the Data: Paul F. Lazarsfeld and the Columbia University Bureau of Applied Social Research (/isis/citation/CBB298912382/)

Comments

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}