Written by a team of renowned sociologists with experience in both the field and the classroom, The Art and Science of Social Research offers authoritative, accessible and balanced coverage of the methods used to study the social world. The authors highlight the challenges of investigating the unpredictable topic of human lives while providing insights into what really happens in the field, the laboratory and the survey call centre. A streamlined Second Edition is now accompanied by three new InQuizitive activities and writing tutorials that help students master the building blocks of research and hone key writing skills.

Throughout distressing cultural battles and disputes over child care, each side claims to have the best interests of children at heart. While developmental scientists have concrete evidence for this debate, their message is often lost or muddied by the media. To demonstrate why this problem matters, this book examines the extensive media coverage of the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development - a long-running government-funded study that provides the most comprehensive look at the effects of early child care on American children. Analyses of newspaper articles and interviews with scientists and journalists reveal what happens to science in the public sphere and how children's issues can be used to question parents' choices. By shining light on these issues, the authors bring clarity to the enduring child care wars while providing recommendations for how scientists and the media can talk to - rather than past - each other.

The children of Mexican immigrant families are the fastest growing population in American schools today. Education can be the key to a better quality of life, especially for a population that faces breathtakingly high poverty rates and few other opportunities for social mobility. But these children are too frequently considered at risk academically. What more can be done to help them succeed? Mexican Roots, American Schools offers a fresh take on this timely and critically important issue by focusing on the first years of elementary school and the complex interplay of learning with other aspects of children's lives. Its social policy recommendations will be essential reading for educators, policymakers, and parents alike. Based on the first-ever national study of the school readiness of Mexican immigrant children, this book examines how various aspects of their lives-including health, the home environment, and childcare arrangements-help or hurt their academic performance. Drawing a comprehensive picture, it shows that these children start school behind their peers and only fall farther behind over the years. The author forcefully maintains that this situation does not need to continue. Crosnoe outlines which factors make the most difference, and recommends policy initiatives that would help change things. In addressing educational inequality, we need to target the earliest years of school and pre-school programs, offer resource centers and services for students and parents, and consider how health and home inevitably seep their way into the schools.

The children of Mexican immigrant families are the fastest growing population in American schools today. Education can be the key to a better quality of life, especially for a population that faces breathtakingly high poverty rates and few other opportunities for social mobility. But these children are too frequently considered at risk academically. What more can be done to help them succeed? Mexican Roots, American Schools offers a fresh take on this timely and critically important issue by focusing on the first years of elementary school and the complex interplay of learning with other aspects of children's lives. Its social policy recommendations will be essential reading for educators, policymakers, and parents alike. Based on the first-ever national study of the school readiness of Mexican immigrant children, this book examines how various aspects of their lives-including health, the home environment, and childcare arrangements-help or hurt their academic performance. Drawing a comprehensive picture, it shows that these children start school behind their peers and only fall farther behind over the years. The author forcefully maintains that this situation does not need to continue. Crosnoe outlines which factors make the most difference, and recommends policy initiatives that would help change things. In addressing educational inequality, we need to target the earliest years of school and pre-school programs, offer resource centers and services for students and parents, and consider how health and home inevitably seep their way into the schools.

In American high schools, teenagers must navigate complex youth cultures that often prize being 'real' while punishing difference. Adults may view such social turbulence as a timeless, ultimately harmless rite of passage, but changes in American society are intensifying this rite and allowing its effects to cascade into adulthood. Integrating national statistics with interviews and observations from a single school, this book explores this phenomenon. It makes the case that recent macro-level trends, such as economic restructuring and technological change, mean that the social dynamics of high school can disrupt educational trajectories after high school; it looks at teenagers who do not fit in socially at school - including many who are obese or gay - to illustrate this phenomenon; and it crafts recommendations for parents, teachers and policy-makers about how to protect teenagers in trouble. The result is a story of adolescence that hits home with anyone who remembers high school.

Throughout distressing cultural battles and disputes over child care, each side claims to have the best interests of children at heart. While developmental scientists have concrete evidence for this debate, their message is often lost or muddied by the media. To demonstrate why this problem matters, this book examines the extensive media coverage of the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development - a long-running government-funded study that provides the most comprehensive look at the effects of early child care on American children. Analyses of newspaper articles and interviews with scientists and journalists reveal what happens to science in the public sphere and how children's issues can be used to question parents' choices. By shining light on these issues, the authors bring clarity to the enduring child care wars while providing recommendations for how scientists and the media can talk to - rather than past - each other.

How can we create high-quality learning environments for children from socially, politically, and economically marginalized groups? How do early childhood programs help to overcome the challenges created by poverty? Seeking to answer these questions, The Starting Line delves into the ups and downs of early education programs serving Latinas/os in Texas, using the state as a window into broader debates about academic opportunity and the changing demographics of the United States. Immersing readers in the day-to-day activities of Texas's early childhood education programs, Robert Crosnoe illuminates how significant obstacles can stymie the best intentions. Crosnoe pays particular attention to the complex connections among classrooms, schools, families, and communities, as well as the frequently unfolding interplay of educational philosophies. The result is a story highlighting the promises of early childhood education, the perils faced in attempting to fulfill them, and the degree to which Texas stands at the forefront of some larger movements and lags behind in others. Giving voice to bilingual educators and low-income Latina/o families, this book is a timely exploration of the strengths and needs of what will soon be the largest share of the US child population.

The Encyclopedia of the Life Course and Human Development examines three key life stages from a sociological perspective, exploring how enduring experiences, as well as transitions and events such as childcare, education, stress, marriage, career, addiction, friendship, parenthood, disease, spirituality, and retirement influence the individual's life course. The nearly 400 entries in this three-volume set are organized by life stage: Childhood and Adolescence; Adulthood; and Later Life. Included in each is an overview essay that features a detailed discussion of that stage of human development, followed by signed entries that apply sociological as well as economic, biological, psychological, and educational perspectives to a range of topics. Also covered are sociological theories and their significance to life course study; the impact of social and government policies; and racial, gender, and geographic patterns of many life course phenomena. Entries are heavily illustrated with photos, graphs, charts, and tables. Also included is coverage of research methods and key data sources, which enhance and reinforce the topical entries, as well as a glossary, thematic outline, annotated bibliography, and cumulative index.