Middletown Studies - Implications

Implications

The Middletown study is often quoted as an example of the adage, "nothing really changes". Despite being conducted in 1925, the description of American culture and attitudes has remained largely unchanged. For example, even today, many news agencies, when trying to figure out what the "average American" believes, visit Muncie, Indiana. Pollsters do as well - the city has, for the most part, successfully predicted the election of U.S. presidents.

This view was only furthered by the results of the second study - if the Great Depression was unable to cause major changes in the town's social structure, the implication is that nothing will.

While a growing number of sociologists and social critics (i.e., Robert D. Putnam) complain of less community involvement, their detractors point directly to the Middletown study. The argument is this: in 1925, observers were worried that new inventions such as the radio were destroying community ties, that morality was on the decline, and that the very fabric of American democracy was in danger. However, many modern critics repeat exactly the same concerns as those raised by the Middletown studies, although these concerns have never come true. Supporters of the studies thus argue that every generation simply "reinvents" new problems without realizing that their ancestors had the same unfounded worries.

The Lynds tried carefully to avoid any ideological biases in the first study, offering it as a neutral set of observations. However, others have drawn different conclusions from the study. To name just a few examples:

• Marxists point to the "business class" and its ideology as the reason why workers and labor unions have never gained power.
• Conservatives (including sociologists who followed the structural functionalism school) saw the study as a confirmation that a lack of change is good for society.
• Critics of American culture, such as H.L. Mencken and Sinclair Lewis, author of Babbitt, cited the Middletown studies as examples of the banality and shallowness of American life.