This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Web of Science (1) Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Douglas, S. J. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Personal Influence and the Bracketing of Women's History

University of Michigan

This article reviews both what Personal Influence revealed about the two-step flow within women's inter-personal networks and what it failed to capture about women's experiences during the tumultuous changes in gender roles between 1945, when the data were collected, and 1955, when the study was published. One of the central contradictions of the Decatur Study is that it simultaneously disguises that it is women who are being studied here yet universalizes them as representative of the general population. But the article also argues that despite the blind spots and ahistoricity of Personal Influence, it was a crucial reminder that women, despite being individual targets of much media fare, were also embedded in social networks through which they influenced other women and were, in turn, influenced by them.

Key Words: women • women and World War II • opinion leaders • gregariousness • Herta Herzog, Personal Influence

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 608, No. 1, 41-50 (2006)
DOI: 10.1177/0002716206292458


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?