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This department is devoted to shorter reports on research in the communications field. Readers are invited to submit summaries of investigative studies interesting for content, method or implications for further research.

Documents the frequency and length of the jobless spells of black and white workers. Analysis reveals a persistent racial difference. Racial disparity is not explained by inflexible wage expectations or observable worker characteristics but appears to reflect differing constraints upon job search. (Abstract amended)

This article is an exploration of racial differences in the intersegment mobility process in a segmented labor market. To this end, a series of qualitative response models describing mobility of prime-age white and nonwhite males through a tripartite segmented labor market is constructed. It is found that demand variables representing labor market conditions, as well as traditional human capital variables are important predictors of intersegment mobility. It is also evident that there are striking racial differences in intersegment mobility patterns.

THE 1960S WAS A TUMULTUOUS TIME IN AMERICAN RACIAL POLITICS. SOCIAL SCIENTISTS CONFRONTED A HOST OF QUESTIONS ARISING OUT OF THAT TURMOIL, SOME OF THE MOST SIGNIFICANT OF WHICH CONCERNED RACIAL DIFFERENCES IN POLITICAL ATTITUDES. ONE FOCUS WAS POLITICAL CYNICISM AND POLITICAL SUPPORT. IN THE LATE 1960S BLACK CHILDREN EXHIBITED GREATER POLITICAL CYNICISM THAN DID WHITE CHILDREN (ABRAMSON 1977), A PATTERN SHARED BY ADULTS (MILLER 1974). SIMILARLY, ABERBACH AND WALKER FOUND A SERIES OF RACIAL DIFFERENCES IN POLITICAL ORIENTATIONS AND POLICY ATTITUDE (1970). AND VERBA AND NIE IDENTIFIED BLACK CONSCIOUSNESS AS AN IMPORTANT CORRECTIVE TO THE LOWER RATES OF BLACK POLITICAL PARTICIPATION GENERATED BY SOCIOECONOMIC CHARACTERISTICS (1972). THERE ALSO HAVE BEEN IMPORTANT CHANGES IN BLACK AND WHITE POLITICAL ORIENTATIONS (CONVERSE ET AL. 1980: 59-101; TAYLOR ET AL. 1978; CONDRON 1979). POMPER NOTES THE SUBSTANTIAL GROWTH OF "GROUP CONSCIOUSNESS" AMONG BLACKS, SUCH THAT "RACIAL EVALUATIONS OF THE PARTIES AND CANDIDATES HAVE BECOME SHARPLY DISTINCT" (1975: 130). OTHERS HAVE FOUND THAT ALTHOUGH RACIAL DIFFERENNCES ON RACIAL ISSUES EXHIBIT "APPROXIMATELY THE SAME DISTANCE BETWEEN THE RACES OVER THE YEARS" FROM 1960 TO 1973, "POLITICAL ACTIVISM AND SOPHISTICATION AMONG BLACKS IS INCREASING TO LEVELS COMPARABLE WITH THAT OF WHITES" (SCHWARTZ AND SCHWARTZ 1976: 157, 167). AND HWILE FROM 1965 TO 1973 MANY POLICY AND POLITICAL ORIENTATIONS OF BLACKS AND WHITES BECAME LESS DISTINCT, JENNINGS APY: 1984

Understanding of the phenomenon of political protest has been inhibited by the view that protest is fundamentally extraordinary or unconventional in character and that those who use it do so because they lack the resources to employ more conventional means of political expression. This article challenges this unqualified view by examining survey data based on black and white samples from the city of Milwaukee which relate to racial attitudes toward protest, the social characteristics of protest participants, and to the uses and organization of protest in the two racial communities. The analysis reveals widespread support for protest in the black community in contrast to the general antipathy found among whites. Both black and white protesters are found to be socioeconomically better-off than nonprotesters in their respective racial communities, but a variety of indicators suggest that black protesters are more integrated and typical members of their community than white protesters are of theirs. Data on the uses and organization of protest show that it has become an institutionalized feature of the black pursuit of urban politics in Milwaukee in contrast to its generally ad hoc and less frequent role for whites.We may conclude from all this that protest represents a widely accepted, integral part of black politics in the city, while for whites protest is indeed unconventional, a violation of dominant social norms. This conclusion is used as a basis for speculating on the relationship of protest participation to the possession of social resources and on the capacity of social resources to offset the costs incurred in the form of social disapproval for violating white norms against protest behavior.

A Weibull regression analysis of reemployment rate data from a subsample of the 1984 & 1986 Displaced Workers Surveys (total N = 4,831) reveals a persistent racial difference in the frequency & length of the jobless spells of black & white workers, both male & female, following displacement. This racial disparity is not explained by inflexible wage expectations or observable worker characteristics, but appears to reflect differing constraints on job search. 3 Tables, 40 References. Adapted from the source document.

A national study of the reading behavior of blacks & whites indicates that the racial differences in newspaper reading is larger than in any other form of reading. Data were derived from a national probability sample (N=5,067, aged 16 or over) interviewed at home. This difference between blacks & whites does not depend on economic factors. Results show that newspapers are not reaching a very large number of blacks, especially the poor. Even in those newspapers read by blacks, certain portions such as editorials, women's & society pages, & regular ads are read considerably less frequently by blacks than by whites. It is hypothesized that newspapers do not respond to the blacks' needs & concerns to the same extent as other printed media. S. Karganovic.