The Hawthorne investigation, or Mayo study, is significant because it challenged Taylorism by highlighting the importance of what?

Correct answer: The 'human factor' and the 'informal group' in raising productivity.

Explanation

This question tests knowledge of a key sociological study mentioned by Adorno and its significance in the context of industrial sociology and the concept of rationality.

Other questions

Question 1

According to Adorno's discussion in Lecture Fifteen, what is the primary characteristic of 'fetishism in science'?

Question 2

Adorno traces the historical motif of sociology's claim to dominance over society back to which ancient philosopher's idea?

Question 3

Which two modern thinkers does Adorno mention as continuing the claim for sociology's dominance, following Plato?

Question 4

What is Adorno's primary criticism of Auguste Comte's 'stages' of history (theological, metaphysical, positive)?

Question 6

What does Adorno mean when he claims that the 'much-vaunted rationality of bourgeois society... is in reality irrational'?

Question 7

Adorno uses the example of the permanent agrarian crisis to illustrate what concept?

Question 8

The term 'cow sociology' is used by Adorno to critique a type of sociology that does what?

Question 9

What does Adorno identify as the ultimate, and misguided, aim of the 'technocratization of the sociological ideal'?

Question 10

In contrasting Comte and Herbert Spencer, what does Adorno identify as Spencer's 'decisive advance'?

Question 11

Which American sociologist's work, particularly 'Theory of the Leisure Class', does Adorno cite as characterizing rational society's institutions as 'rudimentary 'archaic traits''?

Question 12

What does Adorno identify as the primary task for a 'proper sociology' in the current era?

Question 13

The famous advertisement for the Borden milk monopoly, featuring the cow Elsie, is used by Adorno as an analogy for what?

Question 14

What, according to Adorno, is the key error in Mannheim's idea of 'free-floating intellectuals' having a right to social control?

Question 15

Adorno argues that a non-fetishistic, critical sociology has a practical purpose. What is that purpose?

Question 16

On what date was Lecture Fifteen delivered?

Question 17

Why does Adorno believe sociology occupies a 'rather special position' regarding the problem of fetishization?

Question 18

Adorno suggests that Plato's Ideas, in the context of his theory of the state, are actually what?

Question 19

What does Adorno identify as the shared, and mistaken, conviction of thinkers like Spencer and Veblen?

Question 20

Which of these institutions does Adorno NOT list as an example of an 'irrational institution' that has a function in so-called rational bourgeois society?

Question 21

What is the 'misplaced dominance of present-day sociology,' according to Adorno's final argument in the lecture?

Question 22

At the start of the lecture, what was the approximate result of Adorno's poll to see if students would attend a lecture on Tuesday the 16th?

Question 23

What is the reason Adorno gives for the survival of the 'irrationality of institutions'?

Question 24

The old, purely sociological claim to authority, according to Adorno, does NOT aim to do what?

Question 25

What does Adorno identify as the task for intellectuals and for his own critical theory in the face of concepts like 'elitist leadership'?

Question 26

Adorno's concept of a 'non-fetishistic type of sociology' is characterized by its relation to what?

Question 27

What is the 'bizarre situation' that Adorno claims has arisen from sociology establishing itself as a separate discipline on the model of the natural sciences?

Question 28

According to Adorno, thinkers like Comte and Mannheim, who advocated for sociologists to control society, failed to account for what fact?

Question 29

In Lecture Fifteen, Adorno states that the threshold value in the rationalization of labor, beyond which productivity declines, was confirmed with great mathematical precision by studies from which country?

Question 30

What is the 'ratio' or 'raison d'ĂȘtre' of society, according to Adorno, which he argues contemporary society runs counter to?

Question 31

What is the illusion of 'classlessness' that Adorno connects with the modern sociological claim to authority?

Question 32

What reason does Adorno give for why socialists might mistakenly adopt the technocratic ideal?

Question 33

Adorno criticizes the thinkers in the tradition of Spencer and Veblen for overlooking what immense, autonomous role?

Question 34

How does Adorno define 'means-end rationality' in the lecture?

Question 35

What is the relationship between the 'technocratization of the sociological ideal' and the 'unconscious of human beings'?

Question 36

Adorno suggests that a self-restriction of sociology has been 'apologetic in nature.' What was it apologizing for?

Question 37

According to Adorno's interpretation, what is the deepest explanation for the importance of 'psychological moments' in modern society?

Question 38

What, in Adorno's view, is the difference between what he would call a 'theory of society in a strong sense' and the 'narrow concept of sociology'?

Question 39

Which of the following does Adorno suggest is NOT a part of the problem of the 'fetishization of science'?

Question 40

In Adorno's analysis of Plato, the doctrine of Ideas and the theory of society are described as what?

Question 41

What concept from the Hawthorne investigation does Adorno say cannot be derived from the conditions of rationalization itself?

Question 42

According to Adorno, how long has a permanent agrarian crisis existed?

Question 43

The concept of the 'industrial society', according to Adorno, is really no more than an extension of what older concept?

Question 44

Adorno claims that if sociology is to live up to the demand he has for it as a practice of 'self-reflection', it must do what?

Question 45

In the opening of Lecture Fifteen, Adorno finds himself in a situation he compares to being 'like the donkey caught between two piles of hay.' Why?

Question 46

Adorno argues that the 'old, purely sociological claim to authority' is based on an illusion of classlessness. From which thinker does he draw the specific concept of a 'free-floating intelligentsia' to illustrate this?

Question 47

What is the consequence of applying the 'dominance over nature' inherent in technology directly to human beings?

Question 48

Adorno's critique of sociology's claim to dominance is rooted in the idea that sociology models itself after which other disciplines?

Question 49

What is the primary function of the 'small irrational group' (the 'informal group') discovered in the Mayo study?

Question 50

What does Adorno ultimately suggest is the best hope for intellectuals or sociologists?