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Dissertation Information for Russell Shank

NAME:
- Russell Shank

DEGREE:
- Ph.D.

DISCIPLINE:
- Library and Information Science

SCHOOL:
- Columbia University (USA) (1966)

ADVISORS:
- Ray L. Trautman
- Maurice Tauber

COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
- Winifred B. Linderman
- Alice Bryan
- Theodore C. Hines

MPACT Status: Fully Complete

Title: PHYSICAL SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING SOCIETIES IN THE UNITED STATES AS PUBLISHERS, 1939-1964

Abstract: The purpose or this study was threerold: (1) to identify and delineate
the factors that influenced engineering. and physical science sciety pulishing

activities in the United states between 1939 and 1964; (2) to
describe the effects of these influences on the publishing activities
and the publications or societies; and (3) to assess the role of the
society as an agent in the communication and control of scientific and
technical information. The administration of the publishing programs
and the output of publications of the following six societies were examined:
American Chemical Society, American Society of Mechanical Engineers,
American Nuclear Society, American Society of Lubrication Engineers,
Mineralogical Society of America, and Optical Society of America.
Data were obtained through content analysis of the published reports
of the societies committees, boards, and councils, from published comments
and discussions by society and government officals, and scientists, from
interviews with society and editorial officials, and from an examination of
tha types of publications issued by the societies.

The chief elements of change that were found to have been most influential in

shaping society publishing activities were the following:

(1) the vast increase in the amount or scientific activity; (2) the
increasing complexity of the relationships of the various problem areas
and topical subdivisions in scienc;; (3) the diffusion of the boundaries
that tend to contain in each discipline a province ot exclusive knowledge;
(4) the magnified role of the Federal government as both a generator and
a customer of scientific information; and (5) the general rise in economic
indicators. Traditions of society involvement in publishing in science
also were strong determinants ot the alternatives selected by societies
in meeting problems of communication.

The societies were responsive in molding publishing programs to meet
the pressures of environmental influences, but were conservative in their
decisions. The traditional authority of the journal editors to select the
contents of their joumals aM the process of p6er review of papers prior,
to publication were preserved. The societies maintained the traditional·
reporting fonns and styles, but increased the selectivity willi which
information was disseminated by establishing more specialized outlets.
The distribution of scientific and technical papers in journals remained
the chief publishing activity of societies, and the only one in common
to them all. All of the societies made extensive use of interdisciplinary
state of the art symposia presentations, but were unable to devise any
standard publication mechanism for symposia papers. The socioties' non
journal publishing programs, in which no significant change in kind and
level ot activity was mtad, resulted largely from the need to publish
the output ot the societies' technical activities programs, organised
to produce information in nsglacted areas of operation in the scientitic
community.

Societies generaly have not been inventive of new methods and
systems of communicating and storing information They were not involved
in information and bibliographic control work with the same universailty
as they were in the production of primary publications. Some were major
agents in literature control work, but several or the socteties were
totally uncommitted to secondary publishing programs.

Scientists and engineers can no longer alone support the creation
of their own archive of acceptable professional knowledge. Financial
support for society publishing activities shifted sharply toward institutional
support, through the use of advertising, page charges, higher
institutional dues and subscription rates, and direct subsidies. Some
of these sources are being pressed to their limits by most societies,
and trends indicate that economic pressures may result in further adjustments
in the patterns of dissemimtion of information.

MPACT Scores for Russell Shank

A = 0
C = 2
A+C = 2
T = 0
G = 0
W = 0
TD = 0
TA = 0
calculated 2008-01-31 06:01:40

Advisors and Advisees Graph

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Students under Russell Shank

ADVISEES:
- None

COMMITTEESHIPS:
- Martha Jane Koontz Zachert - Columbia University (1967)
- Karen Brounstein Levitan - University of Maryland (1976)