FROM THE EDITOR
I am pleased to announce that Sage Publications, Inc. is now the publisher
of this journal (formerly Behavior Science Research). To mark this
event, and to announce a broader editorial policy, the name of the journal
is now Cross-Cultural Research. It is still sponsored by the Human
Relations Area Files, Inc., and it is still the official journal of the
Society for Cross-Cultural Research. This issue is the first of two double
issues that will comprise Volume 27 (1993). Beginning with Volume 28 (1994),
four issues will be published each year.
The journal's mission has been expanded. Our mission is now to publish
peer-reviewed articles describing cross-cultural or comparative studies
in all of the sciences dealing with humans, including anthropology, sociology,
psychology, political science, economics, human ecology, and evolutionary
biology. Worldwide cross-cultural studies will be particularly welcomed,
but all kinds of systematic comparisons are acceptable as long as they deal
explicitly with cross-cultural issues pertaining to the constants and variables
of human behavior.
The fact that Sage is an international publisher should increase the visibility
and circulation of the journal, which is consistent with our aim to be the
journal of comparative social science. After all, the sponsor of this journal
-- the international, nonprofit consortium known as the Human Relations
Area Files, Inc. (HRAF)--was founded at Yale University in 1949 to distribute
ethnographic and other materials that would facilitate the comparative study
of human society, culture, and behavior.
The several varieties of cross-cultural and comparative research provide
some of the major strategies for the systematic testing of theory about
human society, culture, and behavior. The varieties of such research include
(a) what are conventionally called "cross-cultural "studies in
anthropology--worldwide comparisons using secondary data (mainly ethnographic,
but also historical, political, economic, geographic, and linguistic); (b)
comparisons within areas (regions, continents, hemispheres) using secondary
data; (c) worldwide comparisons using primary data collected at a number
of field sites: and (d) comparisons within regions using primary data.
Then there are cross-national comparisons--tests using secondary or primary
data on nations. Finally, some investigators in a number of disciplines
have used cross-species comparisons to test theories about universals in
humans. The journal is interested in publishing all of these types of studies,
coming out of all the sciences dealing with humans.
For "state of the art" discussions of the goals, achievements,
and problems in the different kinds of cross-cultural and comparative research,
see the special issue on "Cross-Cultural and Comparative Research:
Theory and Method" of Behavior Science Research (Vol. 25, Nos.
1-4, 1991).
In addition to empirical studies, Cross-Cultural Research will consider
publishing other special issues (devoted to particular topics) as well as
syntheses of research findings and review essays on related books.
Melvin Ember
President, Human Relations Area Files, Inc.
and Editor,
Cross-Cultural Research
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