Territorial Spacing on a Beach By: Julian J' Edney, Nancy L' JordanEdney Sociometry, Volume 37, Issu

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Territorial Spacing on a BeachBy Julian J.
Edney, Nancy L. Jordan-EdneySociometry, Volume
37, Issue I (March., 1974), 92-104

• Group 1
• Mike Nolan
• Merissa Lukach
• Brent Anderson
• Mary Frederickson
• Nicole Antosh
• Coureen Walter

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Why the study was conducted

• To focus on peoples use of a large open beach.

• Main concern
• To observe how different sized groups claim
  territory and share space with others.

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Hypothesis

• To study the Social membrane that surrounds a
  temporary group that functions more as a
  psychological barrier than a material one.

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How study was conducted

• Location Hammonasset State Park, Ct.
• Time frame Late June, early July over 5 weekend
  days.
• Procedure random sampling of groups with the use
  of surveys, and interviews.

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Projected Observations

• Local population pressure on group territory size
• Length of occupancy depending on territory size
• Composition of a group in relationship to
  territorial claim
• Impact of group characteristics and the views of
  their surroundings

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Experimental Procedure

• Researchers survey 110 groups, approaching every
  tenth group.
• Size, sex and age of groups were noted.
• They divided each days interviews equally
  between morning and afternoon .

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Experimental Procedure

• Starting points on the beach were reversed each
  time, and also from day to day.
• The experimenters explained that they were doing
  a survey on peoples use of recreation areas,
  that they would like to ask a few questions, and
  that they would like to get the respondents
  comments about the area.

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Results

• Crowding estimates for the total beach
• Territory size and shape
• Local Density
• Markers
• Time

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Conclusions

• Groups of people tend to distribute themselves
  evenly over a given sub-area of beach.
• People tend to vary in extent of territorial
  space.

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Questions to reflect on

• Explain the 5 results of the experiment.
• What could you see as potential problems that
  would change the results to make this a biased
  experiment?