Gatlin, Douglas S.

This research attempts to delineate the communications patterns
within the Florida House of Representatives of 1967 in its deliberations
concerning the issue of education. To accomplish this goal, a
questionnaire was personally administered or mailed to all 119 members
of the House. A return rate of 51.3% (61) was attained. The bulk
of the questionnaire items were of a sociometric nature.
To map the communications of the House, ten specific hypotheses
were tested. These hypotheses concerned the relative importance
of particular types of legislative actors and groups in the communications
patterns of both parties. Administrative officials were also
included in the analysis. The rationale for these hypotheses
concerned the variables of age and/or size of the respective parties
and were based upon the history of Florida politics. All ten
hypotheses were based upon the contention that, as in other organizations
and decision-making groups, in a legislative body there would
exist a "practiced" communications pattern distinctly different from
the "formal" organizational pattern. The pattern which emerged from the analysis revealed that
members of both parties relied upon a small number of education
experts or specialists for information, regardless of the experts'
formal positions. The Democrats did not consider their party leadership
to be an important information source while the Republican caucus
--and through the caucus, the leadership--was a strong source of
voting cues. With the exceptions of Dade and Pinellas counties,
intra-delegation communications did not appear important in either
party. While Democrats did not rely upon any Republicans for information,
the Republicans did rely upon some Democrats (the experts}.
No geographical splits were apparent in Democratic communications.
The Pinellas Republicans were somewhat isolated from east coast
Republicans in the information flow.
The communications pattern between House members and
administrative officials focused upon cabinet members. Republican
Governor Kirk was most generally listed as an information source
by Republicans while the Democrats relied for information upon
Superintendent of Public Instruction Christian. Legislative staffs
were identified as information sources by members of both parties.

This represents a study of the relationships between county
ecological characteristics and electoral competitiveness. Literature
dealing with the effect of urbanization and in-migration on electoral
competitiveness is reviewed. Two hypotheses on the relationship
of urbanization and party competitiveness are presented. Two
hypotheses on the relationship of in-migration and party competition
are presented. These relationships are examined in terms of static
and dynamic variables, analyzed separately and together. Cross-tabulations,
correlational analysis, and multiple regression are
employed to test the hypotheses, and a general knowledge of these
statistical tests is advised.

The relationship between New Right funding in the 1980 election
and conservative congressional voting by freshmen Republicans
in the 97th Congress is examined in a multi-stage
process. Chapter I briefly outlines the previous studies
dealing with congressional roll call voting. An examination
is then made in Chapter II to determine the issue positions
of the New Right and the movement's 1980 congressional election
funding activities. Chapter III uses these established
issue positions to determine conservative support scores
within three policy dimensions. An initial analysis of the
relationship is then made to determine if New Right funding
is a predictive variable within the roll call analysis. With
this established relationship Chapter IV uses regression
analysis to determine the predictive strength of the New
Right funding when it is compared with the factors most often
cited as roll call determinants.

Congress, through enactment of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment
Control Act of 1974, has injected management tools and techniques
into it's division of the labor of the budgetary process. This has
changed the relationship between the legislative and executive branches
of government in regard to the budgetary process. Previous to the
1974 budget reform, Congress had altered the budgetary process significantly
in 1921, giving extensive responsibility in budget preparation
to the President and his staff. While during the succeeding years the
Executive branch had utilized new management tools and techniques in
budget preparation, the same could not be said for t.he legislative
branch in budget evaluation. Two attempts at reform, in 1946 and
also in 1950, failed and criticism continued. After a confrontation
with President Nixon in the early 1970's Congress moved to create the
Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974.

Political scientists have attempted to determine why legislators
vote as they do on proposed legislation. An integral part
of this research is how selected demographic characteristics
influence legislators on roll-call votes. Party, region, and
senators' service on the Foreign Relations Committee are found
here to be related to senators' votes on foreign aid legislation,
the issue perhaps most representative of voting on foreign policy
in general. While these relationships are significant in several
sessions of the Congresses studied here, none of them remain
statistically significant throughout the eight sessions of the
four Congresses studied. Even where significant relationships
have been hypothesized here on the basis of past research findings,
findings from the present study do not altogether support earlier
findings. In particular, service on the Foreign Relations Committee
ceases to be a significant determinant in later sessions and
representing Eastern states is the strongest regional determinant.

The purpose of this thesis was to test hypotheses
associated with the "two-step flow of communication." The
uniqueness of this study rests in the new type of issue
used as a data base--public school desegregation. This
study relied on a larger effort by Drs. Douglas S. Gatlin,
Everett F. Cataldo, and Micheal W. Giles in which over
6,000 respondents from eight Florida counties were interviewed.
The extremely narrow context of personal influence
and the overwhelming importance of personal experiences in
explaining why people change their minds suggest that
successful community adjustment to integrated schooling
will become a reality only through careful re-evaluation
of existing desegregation policy.

This thesis examines the relationship between personal trust and
cynicism and political trust and cynicism. In addition, it relates
trust and cynicism to such variables as socio-economic status,
issue orientation, voting behavior, partisanship, and political
efficacy. The research revealed that political cynicism often exists
independently of personal cynicism. Another important finding was
that political cynicism is a flexible attitude that can vary over
time. In addition, the data revealed that political cynicism is
very significantly related to political variables.

The purpose of this study was to establish the level of parent
satisfaction with the perceived quality of courses and instruction in
the public schools; to test the relationships between the level of parent
satisfaction and a series of demographic characteristics of the parent
and characteristics of the school and to identify those aspects of
courses and instruction liked and disliked by parents. Analysis showed parents to be generally satisfied with the perceived.
quality of courses and instruction. Eighty-two per cent of the
parents indicated they were satisfied. Level of satisfaction was found
to be related to race and sex with racial minorities and women showing
higher levels of satisfaction. Education and socioeconomic status had a
significant inverse relationship with level of satisfaction. Parents who
grew up in the South were more satisfied than parents from other parts of
the United States. Age and length of residence in Florida were not significantly
related to satisfaction. The racial composition of the student
body, racial status prior to integration, and grade level were tested for
relationships to parent satisfaction and only grade level was found significant.
Satisfaction was highest in grades 1 through 5, decreased in
grades 6 through 9 and increased slightly in grades 10 through 12.
Teachers were identified most often as the aspect of courses and
instruction liked or disliked by parents. Members of minorities and lower
socioeconomic categories were more concerned with basic skills and level
of achievement, while white parents and members of higher socioeconomic
categories were more interested in progressive curricula and effective
teachers.
It was concluded that parents were generally satisfied with the
perceived quality of courses and instruction and that certain demographic
characteristics of the parent are related to level of satisfaction and
aspects of courses and instruction liked and disliked by parents.