Revised: The Effects of Community Size on Peer Interaction

This topic submitted by Renee Carollo, Julie Hess, Elisabeth Herron, Alexis Weitner, Sarah Woracheck ( Herronel@muohio.edu ) on 10/9/03 .

Natural Systems 1 Syllabus---Western Program---Miami University

Renee Carollo, Julie Hess, Elisabeth Herron,
Alexis Weitner, Sarah Woracheck
Lab Proposal
10:00 Meyers
October 9, 2003

The Effects of Community Size on Peer Interaction

Question

Are people on Main campus or Western campus more or less likely to positively interact with peers that they know as well as peers they do not know? Which community, Main or Western, is more likely to establish a larger friend base, and is that a result of social anxiety, environment, or predisposition?

Hypothesis

We hypothesize that people on Western campus are more likely to act in a friendlier manner towards peers they know as well as peers they do not know. We believe that people who are based on Western campus have a broader group of friends, which we predict is a product of the small community environment. Being a small community environment, Western has wider recognition which affects the comfort level of the people who live here. Because Main campus does not share in this small community environment, it does not contain the same amount of recognition thus does not have the same comfort level, leading to a less friendly stigma among individuals.

Introduction:

The way people interact with each other is very diverse. There are many factors which can influence reactions when coming in contact with others. How well a person knows another person, the community they live in, and how a person has acted with others in the past as well as how he or she carries himself of herself in the presence of others are all factors that can sway a person to be more or less friendly with others. These are all factors that contribute to how the community on Main campus as well as the community on Western Campus conduct themselves.
Familiarity can play a huge role in peer interaction. If a person does not recognize another that person may not be as receptive to a friendly gesture from the other as if he or she did recognize the other person. TaftÕs study of immigrants in Australia can easily relate to college students, which is our subject matter for this experiment. Both thrust into a new environment and expected to thrive on it. They endure the same sort of stresses and periods of maladjustments while they seek approval from their new peers. Most seem to adjust well in all situations, because they branc out and interact well with others around them, even though they may not be familiar with them at first They are accepted and learn to love even though they are not as well known at first.
In an article written by Ponzetti he states that college students usually suffer from effects of loneliness. One of the conclusions he comes to is that college males are generally lonelier than college females, because they are worried about not being able to find a romantic relationship and being hurt or rejected in an intimate setting. These factors cause lower self esteem as well as a greater pessimism and dissatisfaction with their interpersonal networks. College students long for interaction between others, which causes them to make friends and relationships with others more readily.
Bagley and Mokhtarian address this topic as well. They say that students usually obtain a different taste in friends and they may look for different qualities in their friendships when at college. In order to make special ties with other students the student must branch out and interact with their peers. They need to make friends, and most of the time they are successful in doing so. Because these young adults are in a new and different environment they feel like they have to make new friends, this lunging helps them to be more diverse and rounded individuals.
A similarly different approach is taken by Huffman and Quigley. They address the idea that a long term residency does not make a person anxious to leave or move. They associate this to the feeling of being comfortable which comes from the ties they make in their community. If a person feels comfortable where he or she is living then it is not necessary for him or her to leave and go elsewhere. The friendships they make which are the result of their daily interactions have a big impact on whether or not they want to leave. People tend to establish roots and which keeps them grounded in the fact that they want to stay where they are. It all ties back to the friendly communities. Because they are in a community setting they have the feeling of belonging and loving relationships. The community setting makes its dwellers feel more settled and at ease. This adds to the friendliness.
One of our main sources, Wandersman, makes some good points when he addresses the issue of community values. He states that in order to better understand the community one has to reach out and go to the community area, which is what we are going to be doing while conducting our lab. Only the people in the community know how the community works and in order to better understand a community we must interact with the people there. This will give us an accurate idea of the community values and make up. There are many factors that effect human behavior, and we are going to try to find out some of them with our field work.
Similarly, Shinn and Toohey describe the facts that communities influence the behavior of the people who live there. They claim that environment plays a major part in the way people act. They help shape the individuals who live there. Social capitol is also a large part of communities. This social capitol is associated with lower crime rates and a greater sense of security within the community, which allows for more interaction between the people who live there. This interaction makes for more contact and thus more friendships. Community values affect the people who dwell there. Because the community makes the person feel more comfortable it has influences on that person. The person living in that community feels more relaxed and they connect more with the others in the community.
Wilder also believes that a group can influence how individuals act. When a person is involved in a group he or she becomes more like that group. This relates in that the small community of Western may influence people to me more focused on small community values, and a large community like Main Campus may influence people to be more focused on the individual because of the amount of people. These different focuses may cause people to react differently to others. Some people, because they are on the smaller campus, may be very open to the small community values, others may reject the closeness and veer towards main campus. These two different attitudes can be avoided if the community does its job. Our job is to find out if Western really does invoke that small community feeling and make everyone comfortable with their surroundings.
Not only does environment influence people but inherent traits play just as big a part. The personality of the individual has a huge impact on how the individual reacts to others. Creed says socially anxious individuals tend to get more nervous when they are faced with situations in which interaction with others is necessary. Some individuals tend to be shyer than others which can affect their treatment and reactions towards others. If a person is self conscious or insecure with who they are they will be less likely to branch out and try to interact with people around them.
Fuller also responds to this issue, saying that the self esteem of an individual can make how they interact with others very different than would be expected otherwise. If a person is very confident then he or she does not have to worry about branching out and making more friends. If a person is not confident then he or she will not branch out very easily. How involved a student is in his or her environment can add to or detract from their self esteem, and thus their interaction with others. When groups get together with collective self esteems they are able to adjust better to college, they help each other and are making friends in the process, which helps the interaction factor. This all relates to the community the people experience
Li and Hong have conducted a similar study and their results may match up with ours. They discovered that those in the smaller communities were more connected than those in the bigger communities. We expect that western, the smaller community, will be more connected and thus friendlier than main campus, the bigger community. These ideas have many factors helping them out. The small community security and many others are examples of these. This is an idea that much research has provided.

Methods

In order to determine the friendliness of people on Western when
compared to those on Main, we began by surveying 150 students (25 from
6 different dorms). The questions on the survey are specified on
another page. Based on their responses, these students are ranked Ònot
friendly,Ó Òfriendly,Ó or Òvery friendly.Ó Then we did a population
test by saying hello to various people in various locations. Their
responses were then ranked Ònot friendly,Ó Òfriendly,Ó or Òvery
friendly.Ó

Method for greeting process:
1. Go to specified location
2. Situate yourself to appear natural in selected environment
i.e.- if at food court, eat food
3. As someone walks by you, casually smile and say ÒhelloÓ
4. Record their response on sheet
5. Repeat the previous two steps the desired amount of times

Ranks of responses:

Not friendly: ignores hello and/or gives rude look

Friendly: responds in a manner equivalent to your salutation

Extremely friendly: A conversation stems from greeting
i.e.- ÒHow are you?Ó or ÒWhatÕs up?Ó

Name of Greeter: Gender (Circle one): M / F
Location:

Number of
Person Gender (M/F) Not Friendly Friendly Very Friendly
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20

In order to do a more in depth population study, 25 students will be
surveyed from 6 dorms, two main campus dorms (Dorsey and Morris), two
western dorms (Mary Lyon and Peabody), and two control dorms
(Havinghurst and Clawson). Random students in the dorms will be asked
to fill out the following survey about their social relationships and
their personalities.

Year First/Second/Third/Fourth/Fifth+
Gender M/F
Major___________________________________
Dorm-
Mary Lyon
Peabody
Havinghurst
Clawson
Dorsey
Morris

Circle the appropriate response

How many friends do you have at Miami?

0-10 11-20 21-30 31-40 41-50 50+

Approximately how many people live in your corridor? _______
How many friends do you have in your corridor? ________
How many clubs/activities are you involved in at Miami?
1 2 3 4 5+

How many friends have you made through a club/organization?
0 1-10 11-20 21-30 31-40 41-50 51+

How many of your fellow classmates from home attend Miami?
0 1-4 5-8 9-12 13-16 17+

How many of your close friends from home attend Miami?
0 1-4 5-8 9-12 13-16 17+

How many friends from home do you spend time with on a regular basis
(at least once a week)?
0 1 2 3 4 5+

How many friends from home do you still keep in touch with?
0 1-4 5-8 9-12 13-16 17+

Which group of people would you say is friendlier: Western Campus
Students or Main Campus Students?

Western Campus Main Campus

How do you respond when a strangers smiles at you, or says hello in
passing?

Ignore them/Disregard them

Respond equally to them
Begin a conversation with them (e.g. How are you? WhatÕs up? Etc.)

The two most characteristic descriptions of friendly person are:
Cheerful
Talkative
Outgoing
Willing to Share
Wants to spend time with others
Smiles a lot

How do you feel the following statements apply to you on a scale of
1-10, 1 being does not apply at all, 10 being strongly applies?

I am a socially confident person

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I am concerned with my value as a person

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I am uncomfortable when I am unsure about whatÕs going on around me

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I get so anxious or worried that I sometimes become physically ill
(headache, stomach ache)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I compare myself to others

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I am talkative

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I am a happy person

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I can express my ideas well to others

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I easily fell into place and adjusted well when I first came to Miami

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I make friends with ease; I can easily find someone to talk to in a
crowd

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Results

The data will be analyzed through a t-test and chi-square. We will
use the t-test to analyze the results of the Q-sort and some of the
survey questions. We will then use the chi-square to analyze the
fieldwork and the rest of the survey questions that were not used for
the t-test. Bar charts will be made with the information we acquired
that best represents our final conclusion.

Bibliography

Bagley, Michael N.; Mokhtarian, Patricia L. (2002). The Impact of Residential Neighborhood Type on Travel Behavior: A Structural Equations Modeling Approach. The Annals of Regional Science Volume: 36, Issue: 2, August, 2002. pp. 279 - 297.

Creed, A.T.; Funder, D.C. (1998). Social Anxiety: From the Inside and Outside. Pergamon, University of California, Riverside, 19-33.

Fuller, Bret. (1999). Development of Collective Self-Esteem Among Students: Predicting Adjustment to College. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 2/(3), 213-222.

Huffman, David; Quigley, John M. (2002). The Role of the University in Attracting High Tech Entrepreneurship: A Silicon Valley Tale. The Annals of Regional Science Volume: 36, Issue: 3, September, 2002. pp. 403 - 419.

Li, Qiong; Hong, Ying-yi. (2001). Intergroup Perceptual Accuracy Predicts Real-Life Intergroup. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations 4, no. 4 (2001): 341-354.

Ponzetti, James J. (1990). Loneliness among College Students, Family Relations, 39, 336-340.

Shinn, Marybeth; Toohey, Siobhan M. (2003). Community Contexts of Human Welfare. Annual Review of Psychology February 2003, Vol. 54 pp. 427-459.

Taft, Ronald (1979). A Comparative Study of the Initial Adjustment of Immigrant School Children in Australia. International Migration Review, Vol. 13, No. 1, Special Issue: Caribbean Migration to New York, 71-80.

Wilder, David A. (1978). Perceiving Persons as a Group: Effects on Attributions of Causality and Beliefs. Rutgers University, Social Psychology, 41, 13-23.

Wandersman, Abraham (2001). Community psychology : linking individuals and communities. Australia ; Stamford, CT : Wadsworth Pub.

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