front cover of Political Attitudes over the Life Span
Political Attitudes over the Life Span
The Bennington Women after Fifty Years
Duane F. Alwin
University of Wisconsin Press, 1992

The culmination of one of the most famous long-term studies in American sociology, this examination of political attitudes among women who attended Bennington College in the 1930s and 1940s now spans five decades, from late adolescence to old age.  Theodore Newcomb’s 1930s interviews at Bennington, where the faculty held progressive views that contrasted with those of the conservative families of the students, showed that political orientations are still quite malleable in early adulthood.  The studies in 1959-60 and 1984 show the persistence of political attitudes over the adult life span:  the Bennington women, raised in conservative homes, were liberalized in their college years and have remained politically involved and liberal in their views, even in their sixties and seventies.
    Here the authors analyze the earlier studies and then introduce the 1984 data.  Using data from National Election Studies for comparison, they show that the Bennington group is more liberal and hold its opinions more intensely than both older and younger Americans, with the exception of the generation that achieved political maturity in the 1960s.  The authors point out that the majority of the Bennington women’s children are of this 1945–54 generation and suggest that this factor played an important role in the stability of the women’s political views.  Within their own generation, the Bennington women also appear to hold stronger political views than other college-educated women.
    Innovative in its methodology and extremely rich in its data, this work will contribute to developmental and social psychology, sociology, political science, women’s studies, and gerontology.

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front cover of Political Persuasion and Attitude Change
Political Persuasion and Attitude Change
Diana C. Mutz, Richard A. Brody, and Paul M. Sniderman, Editors
University of Michigan Press, 1996
Political Persuasion and Attitude Change defines and introduces a new field of research, one that investigates the alteration of people's attitudes: when people can be moved, and when they cannot.
Each chapter synopsizes a major area of political persuasion and provides an update on the latest findings as well as overviews of past research in each area. Whole sections of the book center on the three major agents involved in the political persuasion process: the mass media, political elites, and individual citizens themselves.
Political Persuasion and Attitude Change boldly contradicts the received wisdom on the extent of mass media's influence on political attitudes and argues that the media's effects are indeed massive, rather than limited. It explores the impact of political elites on the persuasion process, and focuses on individual control over the persuasion process.
This volume is unique in that chapters address theoretical as well as methodological issues, simultaneously combining reviews of literature with the latest research findings. It will appeal to scholars and students interested in the study of political persuasion in contemporary politics across the disciplines of political science, psychology, sociology, and communications.
Part I. Mass Media and Political Persuasion. Contributors are Steven Ansolabehere and Shanto Iyengar; Joanne M. Miller and Jon A. Krosnick; and John Zaller.
Part II. Persuasion by Political Elites. Contributors are James H. Kuklinski and Norman L. Hurley; Kathleen M. McGraw and Clark Hubbard; Lee Sigelman and Alan Rosenblatt.
Part III. Individual Control of the Political Persuasion Process. Contributors are Steven H. Chaffee and Rajiv Rimal; Dennis Chong; Gregory Andrade Diamond and Michael D. Cobb; Jeffrey Mondak, Diana C. Mutz, and Robert Huckfeldt.
Diana C. Mutz is Associate Professor of Political Science and Mass Communications, University of Wisconsin, Madison. Paul M. Sniderman is Professor of Political Science, Stanford University. Richard A. Brody is Professor Emeritus of Political Science and Communications, Stanford University.
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