ABSTRACT:The power spectrum J À of the excess depolarized component of scattered light was determined from frequency-domain dynamic depolarized light scattering measurements for 10 samples of atactic oligo-and poly(-methylstyrene)s (a-PMS), each with the fraction of racemic diads f r ¼ 0:72, in the range of weight-average degree of polymerization x w from 2 to 67.1 in cyclohexane at 30.5 C (Â). It is found that, as in the cases of atactic polystyrene (a-PS), atactic poly(methyl methacrylate) (a-PMMA), and isotactic (i-) PMMA, J À may be well represented in terms of a single Lorentzian independently of x w , and that the relaxation time À as defined as the reciprocal of the half-width at half-maximum of J À evaluated at infinite dilution increases with increasing x w and levels off to its asymptotic value in the limit of x w ! 1, being consistent with the theoretical prediction on the basis of the helical wormlike (HW) chain model. A comparison is made of the present data for À with the HW theory, and it is shown that the theory may explain satisfactorily the data in the range of x w & 10, although semiquantitatively. For x w . 10, the rigid sphere model having the radius equal to the apparent root-mean-square radius of gyration of the HW chain may give a good explanation of À . From a comparison of the present results for À for a-PMS with previous ones for a-PS and a-and i-PMMAs, it is shown that there is good correlation between static and dynamic chain stiffness, the latter being defined as the ratio of the relaxation time associated with the local motion of the long chain to that of its isolated repeat unit (monomer), as predicted by the HW theory.