PDF(Pubmed)
Abstract：
Human observations can only capture a portion of ongoing classroom social activity, and are not ideal for understanding how children\'s interactions are spatially structured. Here we demonstrate how social interaction can be investigated by modeling automated continuous measurements of children\'s location and movement using a commercial system based on radio frequency identification. Continuous location data were obtained from 16 five-year-olds observed during three 1-h classroom free play observations. Illustrative coordinate mapping indicated that boys and girls tended to cluster in different physical locations in the classroom, but there was no suggestion of gender differences in children\'s velocity (i.e., speed of movement). To detect social interaction, we present the radial distribution function, an index of when children were in social contact at greater than chance levels. Rank-order plots indicated that children were in social contact tens to hundreds of times more with some peers than others. We illustrate the use of social ties (higher than average levels of social contact) to visualize the classroom network. Analysis of the network suggests that transitivity is a potential lens through which to examine male, female, and mixed-sex cliques. The illustrative findings suggest the validity of the new measurement approach by re-examining well-established gender segregation findings from a new perspective.
摘要：
人类的观察只能捕获正在进行的课堂社交活动的一部分，并且对于理解儿童的互动是如何空间结构并不理想。在这里，我们演示了如何通过使用基于射频识别的商业系统对儿童位置和运动的自动连续测量进行建模来研究社交互动。在三个1小时的教室免费游戏观察中，从16名五岁儿童中获得了连续的位置数据。说明性坐标图表明，男孩和女孩倾向于聚集在教室的不同物理位置，但没有暗示儿童速度的性别差异(即，运动速度)。为了检测社交互动，我们给出了径向分布函数，儿童在社交中的接触时间高于机会水平的指数。等级图表明，儿童与某些同龄人的社交联系比其他人多数十到数百倍。我们说明了使用社会关系（高于平均水平的社会联系）来可视化教室网络。对网络的分析表明，传递性是一种潜在的透镜，通过它来检查男性，女性,和混血儿.通过从新的角度重新审查既定的性别隔离发现，说明性发现表明了新测量方法的有效性。
