Hi, I am wondering if there is a good way to have a user be able to place only some of the people they have named in a sociogram stage? Currently, the way I see it, all of the nodes eventually pop up in the bin and must be placed on the sociogram layout for the subject to be able to continue. However, I have multiple sociogram prompts, and it is likely not all names will be part of the person’s network for all prompts. Thus, is there a way for them to be able to “skip” adding a person to the layout if they want to? Thank you.
It sounds like you’re looking for network filtering which can be found at the very top of the Sociogram stage creation in Architect within the Node Type box and can be turned on and specified using the Filter toggle. Expanded details can be found: here.
Best,
Pat
Thanks. I did look into this, but it looks like you have to be able to filter on a variable for this to work. I was more looking for a way for somebody to basically be able to “leave some names in the bin” at the sociogram stage based on their own choices, though if this is not possible I may be able to do something with filtering instead.
@dmunson98 - Do you mind giving an example of a prompt you’re using for the layout task that doesn’t apply to all nodes, and doesn’t correspond to an attribute that could be used with network filtering?
Yes–I am asking about basically two kinds of networks, an informational network and a support network. So of the people named as close contacts during the name generator phase (of which I only have one), I want people to be able to choose which nodes are part of their information network and which are part of their support networks. Each node may not be in both networks, hence the desire to have them be able to leave some in the bin for the two separate sociograms.
My current workaround is to use filtering–to have people sort in a separate stage the nodes into ones they contact for information and ones they contact for support, and then filtering on that. This seems slightly more complicated but is workable at the moment.
As you say, being primarily an ‘informational’ or a ‘social support’ contact sounds like an attribute of the node, which could be collected ahead of time on either a categorical bin interface, or as part of the name generation step.
Assuming you don’t want to collect it ahead of time, one other alternative would be to position all of the nodes as normal (perhaps even using the force-directed layout feature?) and then use the attribute nomination function of the sociogram to ask the participant to nominate, say, ‘information’ nodes. This attribute could then be used to remove those nodes/show those nodes on subsequent sociogram screens.
One other tip: you can have multiple layout variables. So you can store the layouts for each network separately.
I see, this is helpful. In that case I think I will stick with what I am currently doing. Thank you!
I’m still quite new to this so I hope I’m using the correct terminology and being clear in my description to follow. I have created a sociogram in which we have replaced the concentric circles with a blank coloured piece of paper. Prior to this, the participant is able to select alters network data file and then using a per alter form to add alters not included in that file. These alters are carried forward to the sociogram, and what we want to do is link them in order to show what sequence in which the participant had contact with each alter. At present there is first sociogram with edge attributes to can be created to demonstrate successful referrals from one alter to the next (blue). The following stage is one in which edges are created to demonstrate unsuccessful referrals (red). I wanted to ask:
- Do you think a sociogram is the best type interface to demonstrate this?
- If not, what would be better?
- Is there a way to capture the selected alters in the order that they were accessed and have this carry over into the two stages I describe above where edge attributes are created or will they have to be manually ordered and then edges attributes created first for the successful referrals and then for the unsuccessful ones? @Joshua
Cool idea. I like the skeuomorphic element of this.
I’m assuming this is a mistake, as the per-alter form cannot create additional alters. It can only add attributes to existing alters.
Very cool idea. So you are creating a directed “chain” of alters.
Honestly, I would say no. If this were my study, I would create a custom interface for this task, since it is so specialised. I’ve never seen this methodology used elsewhere, and the sociogram interface is really just designed around the typical use-cases of personal networks studies.
The best interface for this would probably be something like a split screen view, where network members are on one side of the screen in a “bucket”, and the “chain” is constructed by dragging them onto the other side. It would be important that nodes could be re-ordered within this chain. The interface would handle automatically creating edges between chain members. The bucket should also be filterable and sortable in order to help participants quickly locate nodes.
If you would like to develop this interface I would be happy to support you. You’d need to find someone familiar with React (the JavaScript framework we use). I estimate that developing the interface would take around a week. If you are interested in contracting myself or another developer to complete this work, please feel free to email me at joshua@northwestern.edu.
We are exploring a tangentially related feature in a separate grant at the moment, where a researcher wants to create a ‘hierarchical’ name generator for eliciting family trees. The reason I say this is related is that, at least in theory, you could perhaps elicit a ‘chain’ in this way by having a hierarchy where each level only allows one node to be nominated. However this feature doesn’t yet exist and isn’t exactly what you are looking for.
The sociogram supports the sorting the order of the unplaced nodes when the participant first visits the screen, including using the nomination order to sort. However, this is intended to help with the layout task. Since you do not know which nodes are involved in the chains, the nomination order doesn’t seem to be useful in the layout task. Perhaps I am misunderstanding the question?
Hope this helps 