Defining Prestige Rank in a Rural Community Author(s): Harold F. Kaufman Reviewed work(s): Source: Sociometry, Vol. 8, No. 2 (May, 1945), pp. 199-207 Published by: American Sociological Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2785239 . Accessed: 19/03/2013 00:48 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. . American Sociological Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Sociometry. http://www.jstor.org
Defining Prestige Rank in a Rural CommunityAuthor(s): Harold F. KaufmanReviewed work(s):Source: Sociometry, Vol. 8, No. 2 (May, 1945), pp. 199-207Published by: American Sociological Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2785239 .
Accessed: 19/03/2013 00:48
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
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of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
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Severalgroupsand institutionsn ruralsocietyhave been consideredespecially ignificanty students f rural ife. In early ruralAmerica hefamily nd neighborhood ere the centersof group life while in recentyears special nterest roupshave gained ncreased ignificance. he ques-tion may be raised as to the importance f recognizingocial stratificationin analyzing heruralcommunity.n this papera methodwhichmight eemployed n suchan analysis s described.
It has been observed hat in societiesof any complexity ot all per-sons are treated s equals by their fellows.Some individuals re morerespected; heirbehaviorhas morevalue or prestige han have the actionsof others. The questionmay be asked as to whether r not themembersof a ruralcommunityecognize nd agree as to the relativeprestige ankoftheir ellows.2n this studyof a New Yorkruralcommunity 4 personswereselected o rankthe families n thecommunityn terms f theirpres-tige. Severalaspects of thisrating rocedure re presented.
In this article major emphasis s given to an interpretationf theratingprocedure n the basis of characteristicsossessedby the personsrated. In addition, he selection f the prestigeudges and statistical ro-ceduresemployedn determining composite ating re briefly escribed.In a laterpaperthe ratings f theprestigeudges will be describedn termsof their ocialpositionsn thecommunity. lso, the prestige atingproce-
1Thispaper is based on data from a researchproject conductedby the author andsponsored by the Department of Rural Sociology and the AgriculturalExperiment
Station of CornellUniversity uringthe years 1940-42. This studywas under the gen-eral supervisionof ProfessorLeonard S. Cottrell, Jr. A previous publication on thisproject is by the writerand is entitledPrestige Classes in a New York Rural Com-munity,CornellUniversityAgr. Exp. Sta. Memoir 260 (1944).
'Prestige denotes the value that an individual possesses which allows him to beranked in a hierarchalorder.This paper is largely a description f what is impliedbythe termprestigerank.
'Cf. Schuler,E. A., "Social and Economic Status in aX ouisiana Hills Community,"Rural Sociology, 5:68-84 (1940); and Lundberg, G. A., "The Measurementof Socio-economicStatus," AmericanSociological Review, 5:29-39, (1940). In these studiesper-sons have been rankedon the basis of social or economiccharacteristicsnd the ratingprocedurehas been made explicit.
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dure willbe evaluated s a technique orcommunitynalysisby indicatingcertain f its uses and limitations.
SELECTION OF JUDGES
The population tudied was a villagecentered ommunityn centralNew York.4 Four hundred ifty-fiveamily nits5consistingf 1235 indi-vidualswereincluded n the original nalysis;6approximatelyne-half fthepersons esided n thevillagecenter nd one-half n theopen country.One-fifthf thepopulationweremembers f an immigrantroupwho nthispaper are designated s Oldlanders.The remainder f thepopulation recalled Yankees.
Fourteen ersons nd the writer anked hefamilies f thecommunityin terms fprestige.More judges wouldhave been employed ad the timebeenavailable.The attemptwas made to selectprestigeudges which epre-sented ll themajorgroupingsn thecommunity. haracteristicsonsideredin selecting restigeudges wereprestige ank,ethnicaffiliation,ge, sex,occupation,articipationn theorganizedife ofthecommunity,ears ivedin thecommunitynd residencen thevillage or in the opencountry.Theextentof the writer's ontactswiththe variouscommunitymemberswas
also a factor,lthough ota purposivene, n theselectionfprestigeudges.Prestige udgeswereinstructedo rankthe family nits in termsof"whatpeoplethought f them," their tandingn thecommunity,"theirpopularity,"r as one judge expressedt "theirrating n society."These,thewriter ad discovered, erethe folkexpressionsommon n the com-munitywhichdenoted prestigerank. The writer arefully voided sug-gesting o the judges any criterion f prestige ank,such as occupationor level of living. Duringthe ratingprocedure udges gave theirreasonsforranking he families s theydid. Personswereranked n 11 classes;thesewerenumbered rom forthehighest restige hrough .5, 2, 2.5, 3,etc. to 6 for he owestrank.
DERIVATION OF COMPOSITE RATINGS
It is necessary hatsomeratingbe taken as a basis of comparisonn
4The fieldstudy was made duringthe latter part of 1940 and the earlierportionof 1941.
5Family units include all small families,persons living alone in ahousehold andindividuals iving n householdswithnon-relatives.
'See Kaufman op. cit. This pubication gives a more detailed descriptionof theresearch ite and fieldprocedures.
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analyzing oth therank of the persons ated and the ratings ivenby eachprestigeudge. The mean of the ratings iven ach family ead appeared obe the mostdesirablemeasure or hispurpose. Four hundred ighteen,r
over90 percentof the455 family eads wereratedbyfour rmoreudges.8These 418 persons onstitute he population nalyzedin this paper.
After few deviantratingswereomitted,9hemeansof the distribu-tionsofpersons ated were computed nd grouped n 11 classes. Each ofthe prestige lasses,except 1 and 6 was designated y its midpoint.Thevalues by whichthe prestige lasseswere designated re termed he conm-posite ratings f prestige.'0The interval or class 1 is 1-1.24,class 1.5 is
TABLE 1PRESTIGE CLASS DISTRIBUTION OF THE 418 FAMILY HEADS AND THE MEAN AVERAGE
'In over 95 per cent of the 418 distributionswith four or more ratings, he mean,median and mode are either the same or do not deviate more than 0.5 of a class fromeach other.
8Over80 per cent of the 455 familyheads had eight or more ratings.The mediannumberof ratings was 10. The mean number of heads rankedby the 14 judges was340, or 73 per cent of the total of 455.
9Ratingswere considered o be highlydeviant if theyvaried more than 1.5 classes
fromthe-meanand if therewere no otherratings n the distribution f this or similarvalue, Two judges were responsiblefor over one-half of the highly deviant ratingsand theirratingswere omittedfromthe final computatonas were the highlydeviantratingsof other judges. The compositeratingswould have been changed very little,however, even though the highlydeviant ratingshad not been omitted because thedeviant ratingstended to cancel each other.
"0Forothermethods of givingthe ratings of several judges a compositevalue seeGuilford,J. P., PsychometricMethods, Chap. IX, (1936).
Prestige classes are designated by numbers and arithmeticalprocesses are em-ployed in deriving composite ratingfor sake of convenience. The theory of "inter-changeable units" and related hypothesesare not implied. No assumption is made,e.g., that the social distance (whatever this mightmean) is necessarilythe same be-tweenclasses 1 and 2 as betweenclasses 4 and 5.
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1.25-1.74, lass 2 is 1.75-2.24, tc., through o class 6 the nterval f whichis 5.75-6.
Prestige lass distributionsf the418 family eads are shownn table 1.
The prestige lassdistributions seen to be of thebell-shaped ype. Approx-imately ne-sixth f the populations in the four pperprestige lasses, wo-thirdsn the threemiddle lassesand one-sixthn the four owerclasses.
The meansof the averagedeviations f the ratings fthefamily eadsare shown n table 1 for ach prestige lass. The averagedeviations con-sidered o be a measure f theamount f agreementmong he udgescon-cerning n individual'sprestige ank.'1 The lower the average deviationthehigher s theagreement. he averagedeviations angefrom .04 to 1.32
prestige lasses; the mean is 0.59 class. As is seen in table 1, thehighestaveragedeviationswerefoundnprestige lasses 1.5-2.5 nd 4 5.1ZOne rea-son for he ower veragedeviationsn prestige lasses1 and 6 are thattheclass intervals re only one-half s great as the otherclasses. Therewasalso relatively igh agreementmongthe udgesas to the rank of personsin these classes.
The amountof agreementmongthe 14 prestigeudges on the totalpopulations revealed y the factthat11 ofthe, 4 judgeshave coefficients
of correlationrom 0.74 to +0.88 with he composite atings.PRESTIGE RANK A COMPOSITE STATUS
In theabove section he statistical perationsn defining restige ankhave been described; n this and the followingection n attempt s madeto interpretherating rocedure hat was followed y the prestigeudges.
An individual's restige ank s determined ot by one activity ut bya configurationfbehavior atterns r social characteristics.n otherwords,prestige ank s not a singlebuta composite tatus. Status may be defined
as -relative ank n an inferiority-superiorityrder. One's relative ank inan orderor hierarchys determinedy the degreeto whichhe has in hisbehavior ome socially pproved nd desired ttribute. tatus, s used here,may refer ither o a segment r aspect of behavior, uch as the charac-teristics hichmake a person hard to get alongwith," r to a functionnan organized roup, uchas teachern thecentral chool.'3
"An example may serve to illustrate this measure. If a person has 10 ratings,fivein class 3 and fivein class 4, the mean of the ratings s class 3.5 and the averagedeviation is 0.5 class.
"Prestige classes written, .g., 1-2.5 are to be read classes 1 through 2.5 inclusive.'Cf. Davis, K., "A Conceptual Analysis of Stratification,"AmericanSociological
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Ten typesof status are described elowwhichthreeor moreprestigejudgesand thewriter ecognized xplicitlyn ranking ommunity embersin terms f prestige.The first ight tatus ypeswere tated xplicitlyr in-
ferred y one-half rmoreofthe udges. Those statustypes re listedfirstwhichvariedmostfrequentlyndwhich eemed o be recognizedmostoftenin determiningrestige ank. Some status typesor hierarchiesre seen tohave had two or morecategories r statuses xplicitly ifferentiated,hilein otherhierarchieshe number f statuses s indefinite.
The tenmajor statustypes re:
1. Economic status. This was indicatedby level of living and apparentincome. Four categories eremade explicit-well-to-do, oderatemeans,limitedmeans and indigent.
2. Occupational tatus. This status was sometimes ot differentiatedromeconomic osition. The statusesof teacher n the central chool,minis-ter,physician, nd operators f the arger usinessesnd farms ad highrank. Educational ttainment, hen pparent,was closelyrelated n theminds f the udgesto occupational tatus.
3. Ethnic status. There were two categories, ankee and Oldland,withthe atterbeingof owerrank.
4. Statusgainedfrom eputedbeliefs n political nd economic uestions.
Some membersftheOldlandMerchandising ssociationwereregardedto hold highlydeviantpolitical and economicviews. There weretwocategories-thosewho held these views and those who did not. Theformeruffered decided oss in prestige.
5. Organizationaltatus. Individuals ainedprestige rom nusually ctiveparticipationn the organized ife of the communitynd fromholdingcertain fficesnd membershipn certain rganizations.
6. Family statuses. Personswho were knownfor theirmarital nfidelity,"commonaw" marriages, r neglect f children ufferederious oss inprestige.Thus, there were two categories-thosewho conformednd
thosewho broke he familymores.7. Statusesgainedfrom sing,or notusing, lcoholic iquors to an excessand addiction o drugs. "Drinkers"wereseverely ondemned y manymembers fthecommunity.
8. Statuses acquired from he possession f certainpersonality haracter-istics s retiring,nfriendlyrhostile n the one hand, nd open,friendlyorhelpful n theother. Some personswererankeddefinitelyower han
Review, 7:309-321, (1942); and Benoit-Smullyan, ., "Status, Status Types, and StatusInterrelations,"AmericanSociological Review, 9:151-161, (1944). Benoit-Smullyanre-gards "prestige status" as defined apart from economic status and political status,while in this analysis these latter two statuses are found to be componentsof prestigerank.
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they would have been otherwise ecause theywere "hard to get alongwith"or "troublemakers."Also, n a very imilar lassificationerethe"just queer," persons f low mentalitynd those withpronounced sy-
choses.On the other and, few ndividuals erenotedfor heir xtremefriendlinessnd helpfulness.9. Cliquestatus.An individual's restige ankwas sometimesnfluencedy
whetherrnothe had friends fextremelyighor lowprestige.10. Kinship status. This is gained fromthe reputation f one's kinship
group, .g., being a member f a "leading family" r of a "no-accountfamily."
In addition o statuses f ow rank ust described, fewpersons uffereda definiteoss inprestige ecausetheyhad been convicted f law violations.
It should be emphasized hat the statusesdescribed bove are thoseconsidered y the udges as determiningrestige ank. More sophisticatedanalystsmight ave made a moredetailed nd conceptually eat classifica-tion. The economic, ccupational nd ethnic tatuses eemed o be the mostobvious to the prestige udges and were probably he most easily earned.This is notto say, however, hat the presence r absenceof thesestatuseswouldhave changed n individual's restige ankmore hanwouldhavecer-tain other tatuses. It is likely thatat least one-sixth f the 418 family
heads had a decidedly owerprestige ankthan their conomic, ccupationaland ethnic statuseswarranted.This was the case because these personspossessed such statuses as holderof radical political beliefs, Orinker,""troublemaker"and other ow prestige tatuses described bove. Therewere also individualswho had decidedlyhigherprestige ank than theireconomic nd occupational tatusesmerited.'4
Two theoreticalmodels f rating roceduremay be noted. In terms fone model,prestige anking s a type of informalmultiple orrelation.Ajudge considerseveralstatusesof an individual nd from hese derivescomposite ating. n the other ypeof procedure judge ranks n individualin termsof an overall, or composite tatus which is at least implicitlyrecognized y other community embers.The latter description pproxi-mateswhat seemsto have occurred n the rating f a number f the com-
'Prestige rank is defined n terms of the statusesan individualis regarded to fillratherthan the roles (concretebehavior) he plays. For example,the status of ministeris given a high prestige rank and that of drunkard a low one regardlessof who theindividuals are (roles are
played) who act in these positions. The same distinctionbetween tatusand role is used here as that made by Linton in his Study ofMan, Chap.VIII, (1936), except that in this discussion status is regarded as just one type ofsocial position.
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munitymembers. Judgesagreedrelativelywell on the prestige ank ofthesepersons nd ratedthemwithout esitation.
Composite tatuseswhich ndicated n individual's restige ankwere
characterizedy such expressionss "a good farmer,"the leadingmanofthe town" or "a shiftless amily."Much morewas frequentlymplied, orexample, n the term good farmer" hanproficiencyn one'soccupation.Aconfigurationf statuses eemsto have been designated y such a term.A man whowas "a good farmer"was expected o conformo the moresand the aws, to participateo some extent n the organizedifeofthecom-munity nd "to get alongwithhis neighbors." f an individual onformedin importantespects o this composite tatushis prestige ank n the com-
munity, suallyclass 3 or3.5, was wellrecognized.CONSISTENT AND INCONGRUOUS STATUSES
Judges eemed to expect that all the major statusesof an individualshouldhave similar restige alue or be consistent ith ach otherwithre-gardtorank.This was thecase for largeportion f thepopulation. restigejudges had difficulty,owever,n ranking ersonswho possessedwhatmightbe termedncongruoustatuses. An incongruoustatus may be defined s
one whichhas decidely igher r owerprestige hanthe othermajor tatuseswhich n individual ills. A personmayhave all theimportanttatusesof"a good farmer," xcept thathe consumes lcoholic iquors to an excessor is reputed o have sharp dealingswith his neighbors.Excessivedrink-ingand sharp dealing re statuseswhich re seeminglyncongruous,r in-consistent, ithother atterns fbehavior xpected f "a good farmer."
The tendency or ll major statuses hat an individual ills o have thesame or very similarprestigemay be termed status equilibrium"'1 Aperson has attained"status equilibrium"when his prestigerank in thecommunitys well recognized.On the otherhand,those personswho aredefinedby the communitys havingone or moreincongruous tatuses,would from he community oint of view be moreor less mobile.'6 Itwould seem that the greatmajorityof personsstudied did not possess"statusequilibrium" ut onlyapproximatedt to a greater r lesser xtent.
l'This term is used by Benoit-Smullyan, p. cit. This writersuggeststhat "statusequilibrium" s more likelyto be attained in the less complexand less mobile societies.
'6It would also be necessaryto acquire an individual'sdefinition f his social posi-tion beforehis mobile characteristics ould be adequately described.The question mightbe raised whether or not the possession of incongruous tatusesmight be a source ofpersonality ensionand conflict.
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It is a matter f degree;somepersons ossessedhighlyncongruoustatusesand others ess so.17
Persons n which herewas relatively igh greementmong he udges
concerningrestige ankwere more ikely o be found n classes 1, 3, 3.5,5.5 and 6. This is indicated y thefact,which s seen abovein table 1, thattheseclasses have the lowermeanaveragedeviations.On the otherhand,therewas likely o be less agreements to prestige ank and the averagedeviationswerehigher n ratings orpersons n classes 1.5-2.5 and 4-5.18
Judgesmostfrequentlytatedor intimated heir riteria fprestigenratingndividuals hopossessedncongruoustatuses. A number fpersonsofthistypewhoseprestige ankwas notclearly efinedwere found n pres-
tigeclasses 4.5 and 5. "These persons" s one judge stated, lack some-thingwhich good substantial itizenhas." This particularudge rankedmostof "thegoodsubstantial itizens" nprestige lass 3 withrelative ase,butrating he ndividualswho"lackedsomething" as a moredifficultro-cedure. Some statusespossessed ypersons n classes4-5who weredifficultto rate were (1) drunkenness,2) unlikeable r "hard to get along with"personality,3) illicit sex behavior, 4) inability o supportone's familyand (5) lowmentalityrpsychotic ehavior.
If an individualwas "a generalno-account" e was easilyplaced inthe lowest lass. The judgesagreed thattherewere a fewpersons f thistypein the community. ut the personwho possessedboth the statusesof"thesubstantial itizen" nd behaviorwith definite egative alue wasmuchmoredifficultorank. Someraters idas one udgedescribedn refer-ring o hisranking fsome ndividualsn classes 4-5: "I've beenplenty asyon a lotofthesepeople."Other tatementsf udgeswhich ndicated ncon-gruous tatuseswere, he is a finefellow ut-," or "a hard man to place
because-.'There was highdisagreementmong he udgesconcerninghe relativeprestige ank of mostmembers f theOldlandMerchandising ssociation.The meanaveragedeviation orthe members f this groupwas 0.91 pres-tigeclass as comparedwith0.59 class for hetotalpopulation.Most mem-bersoftheMerchandisingssociation roupwereregarded s "highly ub-stantialpersons"exceptfortheirdeviantbeliefson certainpoliticaland
"7The verage deviationmightbe regarded s crude measureof the degreeto whichan individual approximated status equilibrium."'There are other factors,however, han the statuses of persons rated whichaccount
for disagreementmong judges. These will be described n a later paper.
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economic uestions.The composite ankofmostof thesepersonswas pres-tigeclasses4 or4.5. In most ases thiswas likely o be from to 2 classeslower han t wouldhave been,had the ndividuals ot havepossessed hese
deviantbeliefs.There were two typesof individuals n classes 1.5-2.5 whose prestige
rankseemeddifficulto determine. ne was the older ndividualwho wasformerlyeryactive n communityffairs ut now had retired.The othertypeofpersonwas theyoungerndividualwho was risingn prestige.Somejudges ranked these youngerndividualshigh because of theireducation,familyname,and the possibility hat in the future hey would hold theleadingpositionsn thecommunity.therudgesdid notregard hesequali-
fications o highly nd consequently ankedtheseyounger ersons owerin prestige.This was an indication hatprestigetandingn thecommunitydepended o a larger xtent n one's achievementshanon hiskinship ies.
Although herewas a relatively igh disagreementmongthe judgeson theprestige ank of somepersons, hese ndividualswereplacedwithina limited restige lass range. Prestige lass 4.5, e.g., had thehighestmeanaveragedeviationforany of the classes. Yet 97 per cent of the ratingsgivento persons n thisprestige lass fell within herangeof classes3-6;
onlyone udge gaveany ratings utside fthisrange. Sixtyper centoftheratings ellwithin herange fclasses 4-5.Only a part of the disagreementmongthe prestige udges is to be
accountedforin termsof the prestige f the statusesof personsrated.Considerable ariation n theratingss a result f thebiases and inadequa-cies ofthe udges themselves. ifferencesmongthe udges in their atingprocedures illbe discussed n a laterpaper.
