ADVICE FROM F. STUART CHAPIN,

FORMER PRESIDENT OF AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION

“You should seek to become known as a social scientist in the field of your specialty. Do not be misled by resistance to overspecialization…. Remember that research, scholarship and teaching are interacting behaviors, each one reinforces the other. Techniques are no more effective in the long run than the soundness of the basic logic that underlies them. Technique should not become an end in itself lest you remain a skilled artisan instead of a creative worker who invents and discovers. Techniques should not become a snobbish escape device in which you seek mere intellectual security…. Remember that social values are an important subject matter of study and value judgments contribute to decisions on what to study. But try to keep your value systems from undermining the objectivity of your research method. Do not mix your roles….”

SOURCE: American Sociological Review (December 1953).