A POVERTY CASE: THE ANALGESIC SUBCULTURE OF THE SOUTHERN APPALACHIANS.

Social planners have been unable to understand and deal with widespread, apparently "irrational" recalcitrance among the people whose lives they are attempting to "improve," because they bold an essentially rationalistic view of man. Actually, the origin, development and continued survival of many "problem" subcultures can be explained in terms of nonrational responses to environmental circumstances. Drawing on observations of frustration-instigated as distinct from motivation-instigated behavior in Maier's experiments with rats, and on speculations by Toynbee, the author maintains that, to explain, predict and alter the behavior of people in such subcultures, one must recognize the extent to which it reflects that institutionalized nonrational response to frustration which is here termed the "analgesic subculture". The assertion is exemplified by reference to the folk subculture of the Southern Appalachians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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