Citation

Geiger K, Sokol R. Am. J. Sociol. 1959; 65(2): 174-181.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1959, University of Chicago Press)

DOI

10.1086/222659

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Research has shown an inverse relationship between enthusiasm for television-watching and social class. In pursuit of the hypothesis that a normative factor constitutes a partial explanation for this pattern, several techniques for judging normativeness are discussed and discarded for an indirect method. The extent to which autistic perception occurs in respect to the behavior of positive reference groups indicates a mild taboo in the middle class but not in the working class. A standardized measure of autism in social perception also suggests variation in rank order of relevance to television-watching of different reference-group categories among different social roles.