Mark Abrams Prize
[Page first published 20 April 2012: last updated 24 April 2012]
The prize was set up in 1986 to celebrate the 80th birthday of Dr Mark Abrams.
This was at the invitation of John Hall, who had worked closely with Dr Abrams since 1970, and who was looking to put to good use residual funds from "Quantitative Sociology Newsletter" (QSN) of which he had been editor and which had ceased publication in 1982. After much hesitation (the British Sociological Association was about to establish an award in memory of his son, Philip Abrams, Professor of Sociology at Durhem University, who died suddenly in 1981) Dr Abrams agreed to give his name to a new prize to be awarded via the Social Research Association (SRA) "for the best piece of work linking survey research, social theory and/or social policy" and using his 1974 paper Social Surveys, Social Theory and Social Policy as a guide. The prize was to be worth £50, interest on the £1150 of residual funds of QSN.
The prize was administered from the Survey Research Unit at the Polytechnic of North London and had a panel of judges assembled and chaired by John Hall, who also organised publicity and actively trawled for entries. Each year, from the dozen or so entries, the panel prepared a shortlist from which the final choice of a winner was made by Dr Abrams himself.
In 1989 the SRA took over responsibilty for the prize and appointed a new panel of judges, including several from the earlier panel. From that point, the call for entries tended to be in May (too late for entries to meet a September deadline) entries were not actively trawled and the panel did not always adhere to the original criteria laid down by Dr Abrams. Entries were considered which had only a tenuous connection to survey research: one year the prize was awarded to a piece of purely qualitative work. At one point the prize went into abeyance for a few years until it was revived in response to pressure, Over the next few years the entries dwindled in both number and quality: eventually the SRA offered a prize of £500 (the entire balance of the original fund) and then closed the prize down.
Consideration is now being given to ways of reviving the prize. Meanwhile I am approaching authors of winning and other short-listed submissions (where I can trace them) with a view to their entries being posted to this site. Where this is not possible, references and/or hyperlinks will be provided to available material.
The prize was set up in 1986 to celebrate the 80th birthday of Dr Mark Abrams.
This was at the invitation of John Hall, who had worked closely with Dr Abrams since 1970, and who was looking to put to good use residual funds from "Quantitative Sociology Newsletter" (QSN) of which he had been editor and which had ceased publication in 1982. After much hesitation (the British Sociological Association was about to establish an award in memory of his son, Philip Abrams, Professor of Sociology at Durhem University, who died suddenly in 1981) Dr Abrams agreed to give his name to a new prize to be awarded via the Social Research Association (SRA) "for the best piece of work linking survey research, social theory and/or social policy" and using his 1974 paper Social Surveys, Social Theory and Social Policy as a guide. The prize was to be worth £50, interest on the £1150 of residual funds of QSN.
The prize was administered from the Survey Research Unit at the Polytechnic of North London and had a panel of judges assembled and chaired by John Hall, who also organised publicity and actively trawled for entries. Each year, from the dozen or so entries, the panel prepared a shortlist from which the final choice of a winner was made by Dr Abrams himself.
In 1989 the SRA took over responsibilty for the prize and appointed a new panel of judges, including several from the earlier panel. From that point, the call for entries tended to be in May (too late for entries to meet a September deadline) entries were not actively trawled and the panel did not always adhere to the original criteria laid down by Dr Abrams. Entries were considered which had only a tenuous connection to survey research: one year the prize was awarded to a piece of purely qualitative work. At one point the prize went into abeyance for a few years until it was revived in response to pressure, Over the next few years the entries dwindled in both number and quality: eventually the SRA offered a prize of £500 (the entire balance of the original fund) and then closed the prize down.
Consideration is now being given to ways of reviving the prize. Meanwhile I am approaching authors of winning and other short-listed submissions (where I can trace them) with a view to their entries being posted to this site. Where this is not possible, references and/or hyperlinks will be provided to available material.
Prize-winners and shortlisted entries
[Some details to be confirmed or still being sought]
1986
Adrian Furnham
Why Do People Save? Attititudes to, and habits of, saving money in Britain
Journal of Applied Psychology, 1985,15,4, 354-373
1987
Alison Walsh and Ruth Lister
Mother's life-line: a survey of how women use and value child benefit
Child Poverty Action Group, 1986 [Cover]
Special additional award offered personally by Dr Abrams
Kathy Meade
Challenging the Myths: a review of pensioner health courses and classes
Agewell 1986 [Cover]
1988
Stephen Harding
Trends in Permissiveness
in Jowell R, Witherspoon S and Brook L [Eds] British Social Attitudes: the 5th report, Gower, 1988
[Details being sought for intervening period 1989 - 1995]
1996 [SRA News, May 1996 announces prize of £500!!]
Helen Lester
Health Care and Homelessness in Birmingham
[Winner announced in SRA News, Feb 1997]
1997
1998 Call for entries (SRA News, May 1998) No prize awarded
1999 No announcement
[Next announced in SRA News May 2002, but no record of prize. No announcement for 2003]
2004
Daniel Guinea and Peter Betts
Applying cognitive models to question testing of UK Labour Force Survey questions about economic inactivity
(See also: SRA News, Feb 2005, p5)
2005
Winner
Lucinda Platt
Making education count: the effects of ethnicity and qualifications on intergenerational social class mobility
(See SRA News, Feb 2006, p4)
Other outstanding submissions:
Alice Sullivan, Anthony Heath and Catherine Rothon
Educational Expansion and Social Class Differentials Author details
[There is now an updated version using a longer time series of data:
Sullivan, A. Heath, A. and Rothon, C. (2011)
Equalisation or inflation? Social class and gender differences in England
Oxford Review of Education 37(2), 123-138.]
Jayne Taylor and Bobby Duffy
Frontiers of Performance: Setting Realistic Targets for Public Services
2006 (announced SRA News, May, 2006) No prize awarded
2007 No announcement
2008 Announcement drafted, but not published: prize discontinued.
1986
Adrian Furnham
Why Do People Save? Attititudes to, and habits of, saving money in Britain
Journal of Applied Psychology, 1985,15,4, 354-373
1987
Alison Walsh and Ruth Lister
Mother's life-line: a survey of how women use and value child benefit
Child Poverty Action Group, 1986 [Cover]
Special additional award offered personally by Dr Abrams
Kathy Meade
Challenging the Myths: a review of pensioner health courses and classes
Agewell 1986 [Cover]
1988
Stephen Harding
Trends in Permissiveness
in Jowell R, Witherspoon S and Brook L [Eds] British Social Attitudes: the 5th report, Gower, 1988
[Details being sought for intervening period 1989 - 1995]
1996 [SRA News, May 1996 announces prize of £500!!]
Helen Lester
Health Care and Homelessness in Birmingham
[Winner announced in SRA News, Feb 1997]
1997
1998 Call for entries (SRA News, May 1998) No prize awarded
1999 No announcement
[Next announced in SRA News May 2002, but no record of prize. No announcement for 2003]
2004
Daniel Guinea and Peter Betts
Applying cognitive models to question testing of UK Labour Force Survey questions about economic inactivity
(See also: SRA News, Feb 2005, p5)
2005
Winner
Lucinda Platt
Making education count: the effects of ethnicity and qualifications on intergenerational social class mobility
(See SRA News, Feb 2006, p4)
Other outstanding submissions:
Alice Sullivan, Anthony Heath and Catherine Rothon
Educational Expansion and Social Class Differentials Author details
[There is now an updated version using a longer time series of data:
Sullivan, A. Heath, A. and Rothon, C. (2011)
Equalisation or inflation? Social class and gender differences in England
Oxford Review of Education 37(2), 123-138.]
Jayne Taylor and Bobby Duffy
Frontiers of Performance: Setting Realistic Targets for Public Services
2006 (announced SRA News, May, 2006) No prize awarded
2007 No announcement
2008 Announcement drafted, but not published: prize discontinued.