We describe an interview-based data-collection procedure for social network analysis designed to aid gathering information about the people known by a respondent and reduce problems with data integrity and respondent burden. This procedure, a participant-aided network diagram (sociogram), is an extension of traditional name generators. Although such a diagram can be produced through computer-assisted programs for interviewing (CAPIs) and low technology (i.e., paper), we demonstrate both practical and methodological reasons for keeping high technology in the lab and low technology in the field. We provide some general heuristics that can reduce the time needed to complete a name generator. We present findings from our Connected Lives field study to illustrate this procedure and compare to an alternative method for gathering network data.
This study is part of the broad debate about the role of distance and technology for interpersonal contact. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study that systematically and explicitly compares the role of distance in social networks pre-and post-Internet. An analysis is made of the effect of distance on the frequency of e-mail, phone, face-to-face and overall contact in personal networks, and the findings are compared with their pre-Internet counterpart whose data were collected in 1978 in the same East York, Toronto locality. Multilevel models with a spline specification are used to examine the non-linear effects of distance on the frequency of contact. These effects are compared for both very close and somewhat close ties, and for different role relationships: immediate kin, extended kin, friends and neighbours. The results show that e-mail contact is generally insensitive to distance, but tends to increase for transoceanic relationships greater than 3000 miles apart. Face-to-face contact remains strongly related to short distances (within five miles), while distance has little impact on how often people phone each other at the regional level (within 100 miles). The study concludes that e-mail has only somewhat altered the way people maintain their relationships. The frequency of face-to-face contact among socially close friends and relatives has hardly changed between the 1970s and the 2000s, although the frequency of phone contact has slightly increased. Moreover, the sensitivity of these relationships to distance has remained similar, despite the communication opportunities of the Internet and low-cost telephony.
This paper presents a data collection effort designed to incorporate the social dimension in social activity-travel behavior by explicitly studying the link between individuals' social activities and their social networks. The main hypothesis of the data collection effort is that individuals' travel behavior is conditional upon their social networks; that is, a key cause of travel behavior is the social dimension represented by social networks. With this hypothesis in mind, and using survey and interview instruments, the respondents' social networks are collected using an egocentric approach that is constituted by the interplay between their individual social structures and their social activity behavior. More explicitly, individuals' networks are a context within which to elicit social activity-travel generation, spatial distribution, and information communication and technology use. The resultant dataset links aspects, in novel ways, that have been rarely studied together, and provides a sound base of theory and method to study and potentially give new insights about social activity-travel behavior.
This paper provides a critical review of the progress in understanding the linkages between transport disadvantage and social exclusion. It follows earlier work in proposing social capital as a concept that mediates those linkages but argues that transport researchers must not confine themselves to conceptualisations of social capital as predominantly benign and capable of reducing transport disadvantage and social exclusion. A range of hypothetical pathways is discussed, highlighting the Janus-faced character of social capital as a medium for both the effectuation of progressive social change and the perpetuation and creation of social inequalities. An analysis is provided of the extent to which the recent transport-related literature supports or rejects the hypothesised pathways, and key avenues for future research are identified.Key words: social exclusion, transport disadvantage, social capital, literature review, social network 1 1| IntroductionThere is a long tradition in transport studies, urban studies and human geography of research that examines the connections of mobility with social inequality and deprivation (Kain, 1968;Wachs and Kumagai, 1973;Hanson and Hanson, 1980;Kwan, 1999;Neutens et al., 2010), and a range of papers on those connections have recently been published in TransportationResearch Part A (Stanley et al., 2011;Martens et al., 2012;Mullen et al., 2014). Within that tradition researchers have suggested direct causal links between transport and social exclusion (Church et al., 2000;Hine and Mitchell, 2001;Lucas et al., 2001;Kenyon et al., 2002; Lucas, 2004Lucas, , 2012Cass et al., 2005;Gray et al., 2006;Preston and Rajé, 2007;Stanley et al., 2011). Scholarship on these links flourished in the early 21 st century, in part because of the interest the Labour government under Tony Blair took in reducing social exclusion in the UK. Yet, this flourishing also reflects more general concerns over the effects of neoliberal urban and transport policies on the less privileged segments of urban and rural populations in the UK and elsewhere.The intimate connections of academic work on mobility and exclusion with the realms of policy-making and -less frequently -grassroots activism imply that research on transport and social exclusion ticks many of the 'impact' and 'knowledge valorisation' boxes that are increasingly important in research evaluations. However, the flipside of this orientation on policy and practice is that theoretical development has not always been the highest priority among researchers. Past studies have significantly expanded our understanding of concepts, such as mobility-related exclusion (Kenyon et al., 2002), access (Cass et al., 2005 or network capital (Urry, 2007(Urry, , 2012, but research has to a considerable degree progressed through cumulative broadening of empirical research.2 Therefore, the current paper draws upon various theoretical perspectives on social capital and explores how they can strengthen the theoretical basis of research about transport and social ...
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