Structure of Romantic and Sexual relationship

[jobyts]

...from a sociological survey conducted in Jefferson High school.

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/chainspix.htm

Does the big circle represent their football team? :)

 

[Math Is Hard]

Neat-o. Very fractalish.

 

[JasonRox]

Is it sex? Or does kissing or a date count?

There is some gay connections too. Interesting.

One girl had six.. wow.

 

[Math Is Hard]

You know this guy has to be totally hot.

 

[Office_Shredder]

Maybe, maybe not. If you have a graph and randomly choose to connect each pair of vertexes with an edge with probability p, you expect to get one larger blob and a bunch of smaller disconnected things. So this high school seems to fit the model of people having sex at random

 

[berkeman]

Note the 63 monogomous couples in the lower right. Lumping them together like that gives a bit of a false impression to the graph, eh? Oh, and the 12 lucky guys in the lower right as well.

 

[lisab]

You know this guy has to be totally hot.

Wow...I hope he's not allergic to antibiotics.

 

[jobyts]

Note the 63 monogomous couples in the lower right. Lumping them together like that gives a bit of a false impression to the graph, eh? Oh, and the 12 lucky guys in the lower right as well.

yeah, also they didn't show the physics department, mostly with unconnected dots.

 

[Math Is Hard]

yeah, also they didn't show the physics department, mostly with unconnected dots.

There went my coke. All over the monitor.

 

[berkeman]

There went my coke. All over the monitor.

Mine too. LOL.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Don't let my wife get a load of this chart or I'm a dead man.

 

[rootX]

There is some gay connections too. Interesting.

I couldn't find any with exception of one but they were also connected to other color dots.

 

[maverick_starstrider]

I couldn't find any with exception of one but they were also connected to other color dots.

Ya, there appears to be one girl who gets around.

 

[rootX]

Note the 63 monogomous couples in the lower right. Lumping them together like that gives a bit of a false impression to the graph, eh?

In the article, the guy wants to emphasize that there are too many linked relationships (and hence helps him in making a conclusion about STDs).

 

[Moonbear]

Is it sex? Or does kissing or a date count?

It says "romantic relations" so I'm really not sure if all of those are sexual. And if it's just dating, the circle makes more sense. A group of students who hangs out together a lot is likely to date, and in high school, there are a lot of breakups and new partners within that circle of friends without anything sexual happening. Or, at least that's how it was when I was in high school.

Or, maybe it was just one crazy party where they were all playing spin the bottle.

And, it seems to support the notion that the best place to find people to date are amongst friends of friends.

If it was only reporting sexual interactions, wouldn't there have been at least a few dots all by themselves?

 

[Pengwuino]

Some guy is with 7 chicks... nice.

I really do want to know who make up the ring of sex there in the top left.

 

[lisab]

It says "romantic relations" so I'm really not sure if all of those are sexual. And if it's just dating, the circle makes more sense.

I'm not sure the circle makes sense, whether it's sex or just dating...or just saying "good morning." The other strings range from 2 to 7 dots...then we have this 37-dot string, where the first one just happens to "engage" with the last one in the string, forming a circle.

So even though there's a *lot* of side strings, none of the dots in that circle engaged in any other member of the circle? I find that hard to believe.

I'm making the assumption that each dot is unique.

 

[Moonbear]

I'm making the assumption that each dot is unique.

Maybe it's not. Maybe some of those chains off the circle are there because it would be too messy to draw all the lines? I think they may have been trying more for aesthetics than accuracy. But, there isn't even a clear figure legend to help understand how to interpret it, so it's not terribly useful as it's being presented here.

 

[Four]

A group of students who hangs out together a lot is likely to date, and in high school, there are a lot of breakups and new partners within that circle of friends without anything sexual happening. Or, at least that's how it was when I was in high school.

Or so it seems ... According to Why Sex is fun? Jared talks about how most of our sex is done privately. Perhaps there was sex but no one "knew".

 

[Pengwuino]

Moody said the results generate a snapshot of the network of romantic and sexual relations among teens attending the school in this 18-month period –- the first such image of an entire population such as this.
.
.
The most striking feature of the network was a single component that connected 52 percent (288) of the romantically involved students at Jefferson. This means student A had relations with student B, who had relations with student C and so on, connecting all 288 of these students.
.
.
“From a student’s perspective, a large chain like this would boggle the mind,” Moody said. “They might know that their partner had a previous partner. But they don’t think about the fact that this partner had a previous partner, who had a partner, and so on.

“What this shows, for the first time, is that there are many of these links in a chain, going far beyond what anyone could see and hold in their head.”

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/chains.htm

Looks like it was for a study on STD's so sexual intercourse is assumed i'd think...

 

[Office_Shredder]

Some guy is with 7 chicks... nice.

I really do want to know who make up the ring of sex there in the top left.

As I said earlier, if you have people hook up at random you expect to get one large blob and a bunch of smaller figures, so it's not a huge surprise

 

[rootX]

As I said earlier, if you have people hook up at random you expect to get one large blob and a bunch of smaller figures, so it's not a huge surprise

Oversimplifying the process of getting hooked up?

Try that.

 

[DaveC426913]

Ya, there appears to be one girl who gets around.

He was talking about the homosexual relationship. There is only one.

 

[Office_Shredder]

Oversimplifying the process of getting hooked up?

Try that.

Yes I am, but you shouldn't go looking for special meaning into the big circle, because there's probably something similar in every group just by probability

 

[DaveC426913]

I really do want to know who make up the ring of sex there in the top left.

I am pretty sure that the appearance of those connectons as a ring is an artifact of arbitrary organization. While factual, it has little meaning.

If you have a random set of dots laid out and make random connections, you get topological data minus spatial organization. Then you manually arrange all those branches and nodes to be as visually organized as possible, it will disproportionately highlight things like this. It's just unavoidable.


On a loosely-related note, the organization of connections in space has little meaning elsewhere too. Note that several of the structures in the lower left are toplogically very similar, yet they have been represented with completely different configurations.



[ Edit: Doh! ]

you shouldn't go looking for special meaning into the big circle, because there's probably something similar in every group just by probability

 

[Pengwuino]

Well it seems like they're trying to show how diseases could spread, is it possible the big connection is important when looking at how something could spread amongst people?

 

[lisab]

He was talking about the homosexual relationship. There is only one.

I see three. One female-female, two male-male.

 

[DaveC426913]

I see three. One female-female, two male-male.

I fail.

I still see only one: male-male. Far NE "corner" of ring.

 

[lisab]

I fail.

I still see only one: male-male. Far NE "corner" of ring.

The other male-male is actually on the ring...the SE part.

Then there's a female-female on a triangle that's not on the ring...in the NE section of the graphic.

 

[mcknia07]

Wow, talk about kids being active now-a-days... Hahaha

 

[Phrak]

The key words in the web page are "romantic" and "observed". This indicates that the snoops taking data are not asking questions about sex, but looking for hand-holding and kissing n' similar stuff. They've been given (hopefully) some criterion to judge 'romantic relationship'.

 

[DaveC426913]

The other male-male is actually on the ring...the SE part.

Mph. Still not seeing it. Then again, they're pretty mashed together. I may be discounting an intersection of dots that you are considering a valid link.

Wow, talk about kids being active now-a-days... Hahaha

I dunno, I had 3 gfs before leaving HS (and 3 more with HS students once I was in college, but they don't count those in the graph).

[ EDITmg, did I just commit braggery? ]

 

[lisab]

Yes I agree, it's sort of bunched up in that corner. But the fact that there's an odd number (37) gives it away.

 

[mcknia07]

I dunno, I had 3 gfs before leaving HS (and 3 more with HS students once I was in college, but they don't count those in the graph).

[ EDITmg, did I just commit braggery? ]

Ohm, I'm tellin'... Well maybe I just wasn't cool or attractive in high school. I never had any boyfriends. It's so not the case anymore well the boyfriend part, I'm still unattractive, lol.

 

[DaveC426913]

The other male-male is actually on the ring...the SE part.

Ah. I see the problem. You meant the other SE corner - i.e. SW.

 

[DaveC426913]

Ohm, I'm tellin'... Well maybe I just wasn't cool or attractive in high school. I never had any boyfriends. It's so not the case anymore well the boyfriend part, I'm still unattractive, lol.

I'm pretty sure your pic is there in the Member photo thread, and unless I'm disremembering, it wasn't something to sneeze at.

omg, did you just commit fishing-ery?

 

[lisab]

Ah. I see the problem. You meant the other SE corner - i.e. SW.

Ahahahaha, you're right...so sorry, Dave !

 

[mcknia07]

LOL, well thanks.

Fishing-ery? Say what?

 

[Math Is Hard]

I had boyfriends when I was in high school, but none of them were in high school. I guess there's no mapping for that.

 

[Pengwuino]

I had boyfriends when I was in high school, but none of them were in high school. I guess there's no mapping for that.

DAAAAAANG MIH, you got it going on I see

 

[mcknia07]

Woo Who! Way to work it MIH! Teach me your game

 

[redargon]

I notice it isn't time dependant. That is to say, that it does not show which relations come first. This makes the data a little less useful in disease spreading analysis. This is what I mean by eaxmple:
Person A has a relation with Person B and after that with Person C.
Person C has had 3 relations.
So, Person A has had in effect 5 relations (person B, Person C and the 3 relations of Person C (if they all occurred beforehand)) whereas even though Person B is connected to Person A, they have only had one relation as it occurred before Person A connected to person C.
I think this is an important thing to note when trying to track diseases.

It is a very interesting plot though and makes me shudder a little at the possible connections that I may have made in my lifetime.

 

[Huckleberry]

Do I know you redargon? Just think of the possibilities.

 

[BobG]

You know this guy has to be totally hot.

I'm surprised there aren't more loops. The long straight strings seem more surprising than a large ring.

So, the guy in MIH's section is totally hot and his wingman picks up the pieces after the inevitable breakup?

Or is it the other way around and whenever the wingman gets a girlfriend, the hot guy steals her from him?

 

[junglebeast]

I found it odd that the authors forgot to group some of the repeating patterns.

I also think that the interconnectedness would be much higher if they used a time period longer than 6 months. 6 months is very short..I think it would have made more sense to use the period of "while you have attended this high school."

 

[redargon]

Do I know you redargon? Just think of the possibilities.

It's like the six degrees of separation thing, but for sexual relationships. I guess almost everyone has done it with Kevin Bacon then

 

[DaveC426913]

I also think that the interconnectedness would be much higher if they used a time period longer than 6 months. 6 months is very short..I think it would have made more sense to use the period of "while you have attended this high school."

I had not thought of that.

6 months. Stud-muffin there dated all those girls inside of six months??

I'd like to see this chart correlated with a police report of unexplained deaths...

 

[jobyts]

I see a cool business idea to start romantic/sexual network web portal, like linkedin or facebook. It would be fun to play the shortest distance game (the one we played using wikipedia, in another GD thread).

well, the fun ends when you see your blood relatives in the portal :(

 

[Office_Shredder]

I see a cool business idea to start romantic/sexual network web portal, like linkedin or facebook. It would be fun to play the shortest distance game (the one we played using wikipedia, in another GD thread).

well, the fun ends when you see your blood relatives in the portal :(

It would be flooded with 14 year old boys saying "I banged this chick" and fourteen year old girls saying "No you didn't!"

Ye gods, think of the ad revenue

 

[DaveC426913]

fourteen year old girls saying "No you didn't!"

Please. Proper spelling and grammar. "Oh no you di' 'int!"