Mike, that is a fascinating and provocative article. Is social capital raised by attendance at social events where alcohol is served, because of the alcohol, or because of the attendance? Can an abstainer reap the same benefits by such attendance? If I attend and sip water, will I earn the same social capital as another who sips bourbon? If not, does more social capital accrue to bourbon sippers than wine sippers (I would think so). Is there a free ride (free lunch—free drink) for the parasite water sipper at the drinking event, in terms of gained social capital? Is that the free rider problem or the free writer problem (ok that’s the division next door).
The causal relationship between alcohol and social capital is up for analysis—as the authors note, drinkers are more social, but they fail to note this a priori characteristics of drinkers. Can we control (manipulate as an independent variable) drinking while holding constant the personality factor of sociability? Randomly assign people to drink and not drink, rather than observing the more social drinkers vs. the less-social non drinkers, and then assess their subsequent social capital?
The sex difference on social drinking is intriguing—yes for males, none for females—how is it, as the authors suggest, that women increase their social capital apart from drinking in bars—so many unanswered questions.
I liked the references to Putnam's Bowling Alone (which I required, in addition to the regular text, in a poly sci research methods class I taught at CSUF).
When I taught at Marshall Univ our department had a monthly “gourmet dinner.” The pay was low for all faculty there, in Huntington WV (I started with Ph.D. at 18k) but they all liked to eat “gourmet” food so the arrangement was to eat at each department member’s home. There were about 11. All lived within a few miles of each other, except one, who lived 30 mies way. So each month each faculty member would host a meal, select the menu, and split up the cooking across the attending people. Each would bring one part of the meal and put a note in the jar listing the total cost of that part. The host would total the individual costs, divide by the number there, and we would then settle up by adding money to or taking money from the pot. Don, who baked his own bread, always had to put in 8 or 10 dollars. The person who prepared the meat dish always took out money. So the cost to each person was equal. As far as alcohol—I recall that some did and some didn’t drink alcohol, and the arrangement there was to bring your own or settle those costs independent of the food costs.
The social capital gained in these department dinners was noticeable. Two faculty never attended—the former chair, and the newer member who lived 30 miles away. Each was noticeably estranged from the department. The newer man was later denied tenure. Of course there were other reasons for the coincidence of non-involvement in the department dinners and the estrangement—prior existing estrangement likely caused them to not attend the dinners. But not attending certainly did not add to their social capital.
The only major problem I had with the article was, why wasn’t it written in APA style?
I stayed home from the Annual Sportster Ride to work on my taxes, but I’m not getting much of that done, so I better go finish cleaning the refrigerator.
Vern - Great post! The gourmet dinner arrangement in WV sounds awesome! But 18k for a PhD - yikes! So are you proposing a study in the Social Sciences division as to alcohol and it's impact on social capital. Okay, Okay (heavy sigh) I'll forgo the control group and offer my services to be a member of the exprimental group...rum and coke anyone?? -Rebecca
Testing the reply.
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ReplyDeleteMike, that is a fascinating and provocative article. Is social capital raised by attendance at social events where alcohol is served, because of the alcohol, or because of the attendance? Can an abstainer reap the same benefits by such attendance? If I attend and sip water, will I earn the same social capital as another who sips bourbon? If not, does more social capital accrue to bourbon sippers than wine sippers (I would think so). Is there a free ride (free lunch—free drink) for the parasite water sipper at the drinking event, in terms of gained social capital? Is that the free rider problem or the free writer problem (ok that’s the division next door).
ReplyDeleteThe causal relationship between alcohol and social capital is up for analysis—as the authors note, drinkers are more social, but they fail to note this a priori characteristics of drinkers. Can we control (manipulate as an independent variable) drinking while holding constant the personality factor of sociability? Randomly assign people to drink and not drink, rather than observing the more social drinkers vs. the less-social non drinkers, and then assess their subsequent social capital?
The sex difference on social drinking is intriguing—yes for males, none for females—how is it, as the authors suggest, that women increase their social capital apart from drinking in bars—so many unanswered questions.
I liked the references to Putnam's Bowling Alone (which I required, in addition to the regular text, in a poly sci research methods class I taught at CSUF).
When I taught at Marshall Univ our department had a monthly “gourmet dinner.” The pay was low for all faculty there, in Huntington WV (I started with Ph.D. at 18k) but they all liked to eat “gourmet” food so the arrangement was to eat at each department member’s home. There were about 11. All lived within a few miles of each other, except one, who lived 30 mies way. So each month each faculty member would host a meal, select the menu, and split up the cooking across the attending people. Each would bring one part of the meal and put a note in the jar listing the total cost of that part. The host would total the individual costs, divide by the number there, and we would then settle up by adding money to or taking money from the pot. Don, who baked his own bread, always had to put in 8 or 10 dollars. The person who prepared the meat dish always took out money. So the cost to each person was equal. As far as alcohol—I recall that some did and some didn’t drink alcohol, and the arrangement there was to bring your own or settle those costs independent of the food costs.
The social capital gained in these department dinners was noticeable. Two faculty never attended—the former chair, and the newer member who lived 30 miles away. Each was noticeably estranged from the department. The newer man was later denied tenure. Of course there were other reasons for the coincidence of non-involvement in the department dinners and the estrangement—prior existing estrangement likely caused them to not attend the dinners. But not attending certainly did not add to their social capital.
The only major problem I had with the article was, why wasn’t it written in APA style?
I stayed home from the Annual Sportster Ride to work on my taxes, but I’m not getting much of that done, so I better go finish cleaning the refrigerator.
Vern
Vern - Great post! The gourmet dinner arrangement in WV sounds awesome! But 18k for a PhD - yikes! So are you proposing a study in the Social Sciences division as to alcohol and it's impact on social capital. Okay, Okay (heavy sigh) I'll forgo the control group and offer my services to be a member of the exprimental group...rum and coke anyone?? -Rebecca
ReplyDelete