ABSTRACT
The establishment of institutes for research in the social sciences is a result of changes in the methods of work practiced by students of human behavior. The social sciences in our generation are just entering upon the stage of development which the President thus describes. From the stage of using observations that a single investigator can make with his own eyes and analyze by common logic, they are advancing to the stage of using mass observations made on a systematic plan by many men and calling for refined analytic technique. The social sciences as a group deal with human behavior. They are concerned not with individuals, but with groups. In the social sciences we have passed through an inevitable stage of speculative reconnaissance; now we are ready for a tamer and more painstaking type of work. Factual observations are accumulating for analysis; technical methods are being developed.
