In 1986, only 1/3 of Americans viewed interracial marriage as acceptable.  However, a report by the Pew Research Center found that today’s public is more accepting of the rise of interracial marriage. The New York Times reported:

The more positive attitude toward intermarriage represents a sharp break from the recent past and parallels behavioral change: about 15 percent of new marriages across the country in 2010 were between spouses of different races or ethnicities, more than double the share in 1980.

As the Executive Vice President of the Pew Research Center noted, interracial marriage has gone from being illegal, to being a taboo, to being unusual to, now, being less unusual.  The article also hints at some other interesting facts found by the study.  For example, intermarried couples are more likely to live in the West (largely due to the  concentration of immigrant minority groups there).

Poor sleep is said to affect everything from productivity to anxiety (not to mention anxiety about productivity), and worse still, it’s believed to affect, oh, nearly everyone. But could this modern malady have a historical cure?

The BBC reports that historians and sleep scientists alike are increasingly convinced that all evidence points to a preindustrial pattern of bimodal or segmented sleep. That is, as historian Roger Ekirch reported in his 2005 book At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past, before lights and blinking devices filled our days and nights, weary bodies would fall into a sleep pattern that included some sleep when it got dark, then a period of wakeful (but still restful–sometimes including chatting with bedfellows or sex) time sometime during the night, and one more deep sleep before dawn. By the end of the 1600s, the article says, most European cities were lit at night, and, ever since, our pattern has been dashed. Our cities never sleep, and it seems we don’t do a good job of it either.

Now, as countless doctors recommend a standard 8 hours of sleep each night (and gently chide those who admit to more or less than that number), a psychological study from the 1990s, performed by Thomas Wehr (now an emeritus scholar with the National Institute for Mental Health), is being coupled with historical research like Ekirch’s to revive the idea that humans are built for a much different sleep pattern than we generally follow today. In Wehr’s study, subjects were kept in the dark for 14 hours a day. It was a tough adjustment, no doubt, but soon they fell into an easy and uniform cycle that looked just like what Ekirch had found in heaps of historical references: sleep, quiet wakefulness, and sleep.

If you’re familiar with his previous books, Losing Ground and The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life, you won’t be surprised to learn that Charles Murray’s new book is ruffling more than a few scholarly feathers. An article in the Chronicle of Higher Education this week outlines the ruckus and a few sociologists weigh in.

The Chronicle summarizes the book:

Mr. Murray’s newest book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010 (Crown Forum), makes a pretense of making nice. It bills itself as an attempt to alleviate divisiveness in American society by calling attention to a growing cultural gap between the wealthy and the working class.

Focused on white people in order to set aside considerations of race and ethnicity, it discusses trends, like the growing geographic concentration of the rich and steadily declining churchgoing rates among the poor, that social scientists of all ideological leanings have documented for decades. It espouses the virtues of apple-pie values like commitment to work and family.

But Mr. Murray, a Harvard and MIT-educated political scientist, seems wired like a South Boston bar brawler in his inability to resist the urge to provoke. In the midst of all of his talk about togetherness, he puts out there his belief that the economic problems of America’s working class are largely its own fault, stemming from factors like the presence of a lot of lazy men and morally loose women who have kids out of wedlock. Moreover, he argues, because of Americans’ growing tendency to pair up with the similarly educated, working-class children are increasingly genetically predisposed to be on the dim side.

(This is the point where heads turn, fists clench, and a hush is broken by the sound of liberal commenters muttering, “Oh no he didn’t.”)

Even Murray seems to know that his conclusions and brand of social scientific analysis and commentary may not sit well in academic circles:

“I am sure there are still sociology departments where people would cross themselves if I came into the room,” he said in an interview last week.

While some sociologists, such as Claude S. Fischer, think that Murray’s book will likely not get much play in scholarly circles, Dalton Conley notes that Murray is:

“probably the most influential social-policy thinker in America” thanks to his engaging writing style and his ability to make complex ideas accessible to wide audiences. “He is like the Carl Sagan of social policy,” Mr. Conley said, “but with an ideological slant.”

A flashpoint for many social scientists has long been Murray’s use of social scientific research, methods, and rhetoric. Conley explains how Murray’s use of social science may mislead readers on both theoretical and methodological grounds:

Although his descriptions of societal problems echo a lot of research performed by other scholars, he takes leaps in naming the causes or proposing solutions. Mr. Conley …said the idea that certain values, such as religiosity, lead to financial success “is a big, big assumption that outpaces the evidence,” because social scientists cannot conclusively prove such causal relationships without conducting randomized experiments on humans.

It is entirely possible, he said, that religiosity and financial success go hand in hand not because the former causes the latter, but because the latter causes the former, or both are the product of some other force not being considered.

Katherine Newman also adds:

Most social scientists continue to argue that it is economic hardship that leads to deterioration of working-class social conditions, not the other way around. “I don’t think there is any question that Americans in the working class, and those below the poverty line, have been hammered by the economic transformations that have robbed them of stable employment, and privileged those who are really well educated, giving them access to the only good jobs we have…”

In light of this disconnect, The Chronicle argues:

At the end of the day, the cultural and economic divide most illuminated by Coming Apart might be one found in scholarly publishing. On one side are authors and publishers who produce nuanced books that offer only conclusions stemming from research, and tend to be too esoteric for wide readership. On the other side are authors and publishers who cash in by producing best-selling polemics, in which research is used to buttress foregone conclusions.

Here at TSP, we’re trying to do something to bridge this very divide!

The Atlantic writer Laura McKenna recently reflected on parenting and came to the conclusion that she is the product of her social class.

Jonah, did you ask your French teacher about why you got that B on that assignment? At 5:00 p.m. today, you have an orthodontist appointment. We’ll pick up Thai food on the way home and then you’ll finish your English homework. Don’t forget to put a book cover on your essay. A book cover always bumps a grade up half a point….

The reader can almost envision McKenna shaking her head at herself as she notes, “Every once in a while, you step back from yourself as a parent and say, ‘Dude! Did I actually just say that? I used to be cool. Did some alien take over my brain and turn me into this Mom Machine?'”

Instead of running with the alien theory, McKenna turned to Annette Lareau’s 2003 book Unequal Childhoods, in which she studied how 88 families from different backgrounds were raising their kids.

Lareau writes that the working class and the middle class have very different methods of raising their children. Poor and working-class parents practice what Lareau calls accomplishment of natural growth parenting. Their children have long periods of unstructured time where they shoot the breeze with neighbors and cousins, roam around the neighborhood, and watch TV with their large, extended families. Parents give orders to the children, rather than soliciting their opinions. Parents believe that they should care for their children, but kids reach adulthood naturally without too much interference from adults.

In contrast, middle-class kids are driven to soccer practice and band recitals, are involved in family debates at dinner time, and are told that to ask their teacher why they received a B on a French exam. They talk, talk, talk to their kids all the time. Even discipline becomes a matter of negotiation and bargaining between the child and the adult. Lareau calls this style of parenting concerted cultivation.

McKenna worries that, while her children may learn how to navigate bureaucracy and manage their time, they may be overscheduled.  “It’s hard to step back and relax when everyone around you is speeding up. My kids can’t go out for a spontaneous game of tag when every other kid on the block is at a band concert or at soccer practice.”

Even more worrisome to her is the idea that different parenting styles may be reinforcing class divisions in the U.S., which is something that a book cover can’t fix.

The U.S. social safety net continues to grab headlines, this week in the New York Times. We’ve noted before the play programs like food stamps are getting in the current presidential campaign. The NY Times article notes that, paradoxically, “Some of the fiercest advocates for spending cuts have drawn public benefits.” Why might this be?

An aging population and a recent, deep recession seem to be at the crux of the issue.

The problem by now is familiar to most. Politicians have expanded the safety net without a commensurate increase in revenues, a primary reason for the government’s annual deficits and mushrooming debt. In 2000, federal and state governments spent about 37 cents on the safety net from every dollar they collected in revenue, according to a New York Times analysis. A decade later, after one Medicare expansion, two recessions and three rounds of tax cuts, spending on the safety net consumed nearly 66 cents of every dollar of revenue.

The recent recession increased dependence on government, and stronger economic growth would reduce demand for programs like unemployment benefits. But the long-term trend is clear. Over the next 25 years, as the population ages and medical costs climb, the budget office projects that benefits programs will grow faster than any other part of government, driving the federal debt to dangerous heights.

As a result, many Americans have benefited from government safety net programs.

Almost half of all Americans lived in households that received government benefits in 2010, according to the Census Bureau. The share climbed from 37.7 percent in 1998 to 44.5 percent in 2006, before the recession, to 48.5 percent in 2010.

Yet many do not realize that it is no longer just programs for the “undeserving poor” that dominate the scene. Rather, it’s programs such as an expanded Earned Income Tax Credit and increasing Medicare costs that have stretched safety net resources.

Medicare’s starring role in the nation’s financial problems is not well understood. Only 22 percent of respondents to the New York Times poll correctly identified Medicare as the fastest-growing benefits program. A greater number of respondents, 27 percent, chose programs for the poor.

Why the misperception? Perhaps it’s because, as political scientist Suzanne Mettler explains in her book, The Submerged State: How Invisible Government Policies Undermine American Democracy, policies in recent decades have turned from more obvious provision of cash benefits to methods such as tax breaks, incentives, and other “hidden” forms of support. As a result, most citizens  have no idea that they rely on the safety net at all.

No doubt politicians, commentators, and scholars will all continue to debate the form and function of the safety net. But everyday Americans aren’t at all sure what’s best to do.

Americans are divided about the way forward. Seventy percent of respondents to a recent New York Times poll said the government should raise taxes. Fifty-six percent supported cuts in Medicare and Social Security. Forty-four percent favored both.

As one Minnesotan profiled in the NY Times story put it, “I’m glad I’m not a politician…We’re all going to complain no matter what they do. Nobody wants to put a noose around their own neck.”

Just in time for Valentine’s Day, a dose of unromantic social science: dating sites that promise to help you meet your match may be asking the wrong questions to create lasting pairs.

Social psychologists Eli J. Finkel and Benjamin R. Karney summarized their soon-to-be published findings in Sunday’s New York Times. The gist of their argument is that the factors that help relationships last — “things like communication patterns, problem-solving tendencies and sexual compatibility” — can’t easily be captured in the surveys people take before they couple up.

The take-away:

None of this suggests that online dating is any worse a method of meeting potential romantic partners than meeting in a bar or on the subway. But it’s no better either.

In mid-January, the Facebook Data Team took a moment to reflect on social networking.  Rightly so, they noted, “Social networking technologies like Facebook let us connect to hundreds, even thousands of people — and have fundamentally changed how people get their information.”

In order to better understand how we use the social network that is Facebook, several members of the Facebook Team conducted a study in 2010.  Contrary to those who claim that Facebook is an echo chamber (in other words, those who claim people only consume and share information with likeminded close friends), they found that the vast majority of information comes from contacts people interact with infrequently.

To contextualize their findings, Facebook turned to the well-known work of Mark Granovetter.

Economic sociologist Mark Granovetter was one of the first to popularize the use of social networks in understanding the spread of information.  In his seminal 1973 paper, The Strength of Weak Ties, Granovetter found that surprisingly, people are more likely to acquire jobs that they learned about through individuals they interact with infrequently rather than their close personal contacts. 

Similarly, the Facebook Team found that information shared by a person’s weak ties had a greater potential to expose their friends to information they would not have otherwise discovered.  Ultimately, they concluded that weak ties are driving information on Facebook.  To read more about how they reached this conclusion, check out the article “Rethinking Information Diversity in Networks” on the Facebook Data Team’s page.

The concerns of unemployment—especially within the last few years—have even the college-educated uncertain about the value of their diploma. The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that a new article shows the type of knowledge and critical thinking skills acquired in college can have a dramatic effect on later employment success. The journal article, by Richard Arum, Josipa Roksa, and a few new additions to their team, is a followup to their influential, yet controversial, 2010 book Academically Adrift.

After spending last spring surveying a large sample of students they’d previously studied for their book, the researchers found stark differences in post-graduation success between those developed top-notch critical thinking skills and those who struggled on that measure. Students who scored in the bottom 20 percent on a critical thinking skills test were three times more likely than those who were in the top 20 percent to be unemployed (9.6 percent compared with 3.1 percent). Additionally, graduates who’d scored low on critical thinking were twice as likely to be living at home with their parents and significantly more likely to have amassed credit card debt (51 percent compared with 37 percent). According to the Chronicle, “The results that [Arum] and his colleagues found were so arresting, he said, that they chose to release them earlier than the follow-up book that they are planning to publish in the next year or two.”

Despite some criticisms about the initial book’s validity and methodology, Arum maintains the sharp differences in post-college achievement are worthy of attention. “That’s a dramatic, stunning finding,” said Mr. Arum, “What it suggests is that the general higher-order skills that the Council for Aid to Education assessment is tracking is something of significance, something real and meaningful.”

Raising healthy kids is usually seen as a result of some magical combination of resources and education in a child’s home, school, and neighborhood. A newly released study by Penn State sociologists Molly Martin, Michelle Frisco, and Claudia Nau and the Census Bureau’s Kristin Burnett, however, finds poverty at schools has a greater effect on adolescent obesity than poverty or low education at home.

Well-educated parents are less likely to raise overweight children, but according to the study’s findings, if the student attends a poor school, the effect of his or her parents’ education is minimized. According to the online news source Futurity‘s report on the research , “A parent with a graduate degree who has a child in a poor school is more likely to raise an overweight adolescent than a parent with an eighth grade education who has an adolescent enrolled in a rich school.”

“The environment can actually limit our ability to make the choices that we all think we make freely,” Frisco says. Martin maintains that poor schools influence a student’s weight even beyond the typically-blamed unhealthy food choices. Low-funded schools have a difficult time offering athletic or fitness programs. Martin also argues that low income schools may house students with higher levels of stress. “Schools with limited financial resources tend to be more stressful environments,” Martin says. “Stress promotes weight gains and usually the worst kinds of weight gains.”

An Associated Press exclusive, published by Fox News, explained that 1 in 14 people went beyond the standard race labels in the 2010 Census.

The figures show most of the write-in respondents are multiracial Americans or Hispanics, many of whom don’t believe they fit within the four government-defined categories of race: white, black, Asian/Pacific Islander or American Indian/Alaska Native. Because Hispanic is defined as an ethnicity and not a race, some 18 million Latinos used the “some other race” category to establish a Hispanic racial identity.

Three million other write-ins came from Arabs, Middle Easterns, or others and who don’t fully view themselves as “white.”  To better understand this, the Associated Press turned to a sociologist.

“It’s a continual problem to measure such a personal concept using a check box,” said Carolyn Liebler, a sociology professor at the University of Minnesota who specializes in demography, identity and race. “The world is changing, and more people today feel free to identify themselves however they want — whether it’s black-white, biracial, Scottish-Nigerian or American. It can create challenges whenever a set of people feel the boxes don’t fit them.”

Though it’s personal, racial identity is also a highly political issue.  Census data are used to distribute federal aid, draw political districts, and enforce anti-discrimination laws.  As the number of people identifying as “some other race” has jumped 3.7 million in the last decade, it’s clear this personal and political issue will be something Americans continue to wrestle with.