Kinetic treatments of glass transition phenomena and viscoelastic properties of glasses

Phenomenological treatments of viscoelasticity and recent models proposed to explain the kinetic aspects of glass transition phenomena are shown to be based on the same underlying physical considerations. This realization suggests the possible unification of these two areas by a single model. This possibility is explored for the simple case of a glass subjected to a single temperature jump followed by a stress relaxation experiment. Presently, sufficient data on any single chemical system to support a critical test of the viability of this model does not exist. Nevertheless, data from several sources on various materials indicate that the qualitative aspects of viscoelastic behavior of glasses at temperatures well below T g are in accord with the predictions of the unified model.