ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses a three-part effort to develop a general framework for assessing the social and cognitive changes brought about by technological change. It outlines the fundamental and persistent problems in understanding the psychological or cognitive effects of technical change, and focuses on some exploratory research to develop a framework and model for analyzing the cognitive and social effects of technological change. The chapter describes some field research conducted to demonstrate the methods used in a pilot study on technological change in the logging industry in Northern New England. In analyzing the social and cognitive effects of technological change, one has to be especially careful to clarify what is being studied. As the technology increases in specialization and scale, physical stress and disaffection increase and a sense of personalized work, personal efficacy, and craft decreases. In other words, increased technological scale and complexity appear to impede the loggers' ability to satisfactorily realize some of their primary goals.
