Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Working Pasteur's Quadrant: Harnessing Science and Action for Community Change

  • Published:
American Journal of Community Psychology

Abstract

Community psychology in general and the field of prevention in particular has unquestioningly accepted the assumption that the research process should proceed in a linear fashion from a search for basic knowledge to application in the community context. This ignores the compelling insight offered by Stokes (1997) that the drive for new knowledge and the pursuit of application can be combined in a single effort. If research in community psychology pursues the drive for application without an equal commitment to the development of knowledge about underlying community processes of social cooperation and change, it will become a field less capable of innovative and enduring contributions to community well-being and effectiveness. Opportunities abound in community psychology for the simultaneous pursuit of new knowledge and more effective practice. We offer the example of a community leadership development program to promote collective efficacy as a case in point.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

REFERENCES

  • Bandura, A. (1995). Exercise of personal control and collective efficacy in changing societies. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bush, V. (1990). Science—The Endless Frontier: A Report to the President on a Program of Postwar Scientific Research. Washington, DC: National Science Foundation, Reprinted, 1990.

    Google Scholar 

  • Coleman, J. (1988). Social capital in the creation of human capital. American Journal of Sociology, 94, 95–120.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goddard, R. (2002). A theoretical and empirical analysis of the measurement of collective efficacy: The development of a short form. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 62 (1), 97–110.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heller, K., Price, R. H., Reinharz, S., Riger, S., & Wandersman, A. (1984). Psychology and community change. Homewood, IL: The Dorsey Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mayer, J. P., & Davidson, W. S., II. (2000). Dissemination of innovation as social change. In J. Rappaport & E. Seidman (Eds.), Handbook of community psychology (pp. 421–438). New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Morenoff, J. D., Sampson, R. J., & Raudenbush, S. W. (2001). Neighborhood inequality, collective efficacy, and the spatial dynamics of urban violence. Criminology, 39 (3), 517–559.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mrazek, P. J., & Haggerty, R. J. (1994). Reducing risks for mental disorders: Frontiers for preventive intervention research. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Price, R. H. (1987). Linking intervention research and risk factor research. In A. Steinberg & M. M. Silverman (Eds.), Preventing mental disorders: A research perspective (DHHS Publication No. ADM 87–1492, pp. 48–56). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.

    Google Scholar 

  • Price, R. H. (in press). Understanding & improving the mental health of populations. In J. S. House, R. L. Kahn, F. T. Juster, H. Schuman, & E. Singer (Eds.), A telescope on society: Survey research and social science in the twentieth and twenty–first centuries. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.

  • Putnam, R. D. (2000). Bowling alone: Collapse and revival of the American community. New York: Simon and Schuster.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sampson, R. J., Morenoff, J. D., & Earls, F. (1999). Beyond social capital: Spatial dynamics of collective efficacy for children. American Sociological Review, 64 (5), 633–660.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sampson, R. J., Raudenbush, S. W., & Earls, F. (1997). Neighborhoods and violent crime: A multilevel study of collective efficacy. Science, 277 (5328), 918–924.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stokes, D. (1997). Pasteur's Quadrant: Basic science and technological innovation. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wandersman, A. (2003). Community Science: Bridging the gap between science and practice with community–centered models. American Journal of Community Psychology, 31, (3/4), 227–242.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan

    Richard H. Price

  2. W. K. Kellogg Foundation, Battle Creek, Michigan

    Teresa Behrens (Director of Evaluations)

Authors
  1. Richard H. Price
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Teresa Behrens
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Richard H. Price.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Price, R.H., Behrens, T. Working Pasteur's Quadrant: Harnessing Science and Action for Community Change. Am J Community Psychol 31, 219–223 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1023950402338

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1023950402338

Search

Navigation