Prestige, Reward, Skill and Functional Importance: A Reconsideration

The Davis–Moore theory of stratification: The life course of a socially constructed classic

“…65 Harris re-analyzed some of Lopreato and Lewis' findings and concluded that a reduction in the magnitude of the correlations did not alter the substantive conclusions they had reached. 66 Harris also reported findings from another [unpublished] investigation that led to the conclusion that the functional importance of occupation roles tended to be more independent of prestige than of reward. 67 This flurry of empiricism, however, left largely mixed assessments of the theory and did not build, in any coherent, meaningful way, on the various theoretical criticisms that Tumin, Simpson, Schwartz, Wrong, Huaco, and Buckley, among others, had set forth.…”

Path Models of Functional Theories of Social Stratification as Representations of Cultural Beliefs on Stratification

“…Lopreato and Lewis measured the four variables of imputed functional importance, skill, prestige, and reward for 24 occupations by a self-administered questionnaire given to 185 junior and senior high school students from Las Vegas, Nevada, and Amherst, Massachusetts. Although the sample was rather small and restricted in scope, Edward E. Harris later demonstrated that the prestige ratings of the Lopreato-Lewis sample are quite comparable to those of a national sample (Harris, 1964). Because of space limitations, the reader is referred to the original Lopreato-Lewis paper (1963) for more details on the measurement instruments.…”