ОПТИМИЗИРАНЕ НА СОЦИОГРАМАТА КАТО МЕТОД ЗА ГРАФИЧНО ПРЕДСТАВЯНЕ НА РЕЗУЛТАТИ ОТ СОЦИОМЕТРИЧНО ИЗСЛЕДВАНЕ
OPTIMIZING THE SOCIOGRAM AS A METHOD FOR GRAPHICAL REPRESENTATION OF RESULTS FROM SOCIOMETRIC RESEARCH

Summary/Abstract: Sociometry is a method that has proven its usefulness in various applications of psychology: psychodrama and group therapy, studying and optimizing teams, uncovering the informal group structure of school class, and more. Although its results, presented as numerical values, are relatively easy to interpret, its usefulness significantly increases when the sociogram is included as a method of graphical representation. The sociogram allows visualizing the attraction and repulsion links between individuals in the group, which greatly facilitates the discovery of subgroups (cliques), identification of local leaders, detection of conflict hotspots, establishing people’s statuses within the group, particularly outsiders and neglected individuals. The sociogram has come a long way of refinement, which was closely associated with the existing technical means allowing more and more flexibility for its creation. In this report, I present some milestones in sociogram development, along with notable optimizations that I have pondered, tested, and implemented during the conduct of dozens of sociometric studies in several schools in Sofia. The proposed optimizations significantly enhance the usefulness of applying the sociometric method in school classrooms and other groups of similar size. They affect not only the graphical representation of mutual (bilateral) choices, but also unilateral choices, indegree scores, highlighting outsiders and other individuals with problematic position within the group, as well as better revealing cliques.

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