The Chronicle of Higher Education is the academic's version of the Wall Street Journal. It is where we go to learn about the politics and culture of higher education and to feel the pulse of campus life and cutting edge research. That said, the Chronicle also sometimes has funny news items...well, funny to nerdy/geeky academics maybe. Take, for instance, the social psychology research by Terry F. Pettijohn II at Mercyhurst College. In an article, titled When Times Are Tough: 'Mommy!'[available for the public for 5 days], his environmental-security hypothesis is tested in a very novel way.
Mr. Pettijohn has made an academic career of testing what he calls the environmental-security hypothesis — a theory that people's aesthetic and sexual preferences are partly determined by prevailing social and economic conditions.
When times are good, he says, the public shimmies to mindless pop songs, and men lust after petite, wide-eyed young women. In tough times, maturity wins out. The public favors sentimental, slower tunes with more serious themes, and men look for women who are taller, smaller-eyed, and broader-waisted. In other words, mommy figures.
To test the theory, Mr. Pettijohn has collected years of data on Playboy's Playmates of the year, Billboard's yearly No. 1 hits, and top-grossing movie actresses, and has correlated them with a "hard times index" of various social and economic indicators from the relevant time periods. So far, the psychologist's hypothesis has held up.
Boy, it makes my research seem far less exciting and definitely less sexy. Hm...maybe I need to rethink my conceptualization and operationalization of cultural socialization...
Posted by richlee at November 2, 2005 09:49 AMYeah, the Thong Song went away pretty quickly after 9/11. Of course, there was also the part where the media was telling people that, post 9/11, we are less about flashy things. I remember many stories about a return to comfort foods such as meatloaf and mac 'n cheese - starting a movement towards "meaningful" things.
But as things improved and we were told that the best way to fight terrorism was to buy things at the mall, bling made a rise again. We can once again find meaning in H2s, fusion cuisine, iPods, and making others' feel envious about our weight loss. Awaiting the next crisis, I suppose.
Posted by: kdsam1155 at November 2, 2005 10:51 AMrich, definitely an interesting research area to pursue. maybe you can do an in depth case analysis of yourself? seriously, after 9/11 there was a huge increase in pregnancies in new york and when i was giving birth in the summer following 9/11 the labor and delivery section of the hospital was overbooked by 300%. not great but we managed fine. it this only true for men? what about women?
stine