Has anyone done studies of social networks and geographic distance
(such as 10 mintue sof commuting, working a floor apart, a building
apart, etc.) in working relationships within and across companies?

Thanks,

Patricia Sachs



At 8:54 AM -0500 9/5/02, Doug Bryan wrote:
>Ten minutes of commuting reduces social capital by 10%.
>     -- R.D. Putnam, www.bowlingalone.com
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Edmund Chattoe" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: Thursday, September 05, 2002 3:31 AM
>Subject: Probably Naive But ...
>
>
>>  Dear All,
>>
>>  I know there's a literature on differences between urban and rural
>>  social networks but I'm interested in what social networkers believe
>>  about spatial effects generally. (I know geographers have some
>>  theories in this area too.)
>>
>>  Specifically, how much difference does spatial dispersion make to
>>  network links? This can be looked at in two ways:
>>
>>  1) Are the social networks of people who live - on average - further
>>  apart (like those in rural areas) different from those who live
>>  further together? How so? (A subsidiary question to this, that I
>>  don't think has been addressed, is: are people in an organisation
>>  more likely to know each other than, say, people in a city block,
>>  seeing this purely as a spatial phenomenon.)
>>
>>  2) What is the spatial distribution for various kinds of network
>>  links: kin, friends, colleagues. I have seen a piece of work by a
>>  social pyschology (Latane/) that asked people to list all contacts in
>>  the last week and their location/type.
>>
>>  Generally, there must be an awful lot of network data files about by
>>  now. How much meta analysis has been done so one could take an
>>  "anonymous" network and say "according to these measures, this is
>>  probably a network from an urban area/rural area/cyberspace/real
>>  organisation".
>>
>>  ATB,
>>
>>  Edmund
>>
>>  --
>>  =========================================================================
>>  Edmund Chattoe: Department of Sociology, University of Oxford, Littlegate
>>  House, St Ebbes, Oxford, OX1 1PS,  tel: 01865-286174,  fax: 01865-286171,
>>  http://www.sociology.ox.ac.uk  Review Editor, J. Artificial Societies
>>  and  Social Simulation (JASSS) http://www.soc.surrey.ac.uk/JASSS/
>>  "So act as
>>  to treat humanity, whether in your own person or in another, always as an
>>  end, and never as only a means."  (Immanuel Kant, Fundamental Principles)
>  > =========================================================================


--
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SOCIAL SOLUTIONS
Work Systems Innovation & Design
Patricia Sachs, PhD
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