University entrants

As part of the study on structure and information processes in a population of first-semester students, a panel study was carried out in the winter semester 1978/79 in the Faculty of Economics at the Gesamthochschule Wuppertal. The aim of the study was to investigate the development of structures in a newly constituent social system and their carrier properties for the diffusion of information. During the first 9 weeks since the beginning of the study, the network of contacts and socio-emotional relationships that spontaneously emerged among 182 students was followed.

Relationship information

Information provided by the respondent about other persons (e.g. contacts with other persons, assessments of other persons, preferences for other persons) using the following survey instruments:

1. List of persons (contains all persons named by the respondent in his diaries and on sociometric questionnaires as relationship partners).

2. Diary (to be entered for each event: duration, place, occasion and, if applicable, topics of conversation and mention of the persons involved (entry of the corresponding numbers from the respective list of persons of the respondent).

3. Sociometric questionnaire and transmission list (anonymised form of the list of persons):
Questions about personnel relations of various kinds:
- who you talked to about a book or before buying a book previously mentioned by the respondent in the questionnaire;
- from whom you received information in the last week (e.g. about the choice of subjects and study plan, about events of the student council, about exams and homework, about the project ´Studienanfänger´;
- to whom one would address certain expectations (e.g. information about earning possibilities or to whom one would turn with the request for professional advice);
- who you would like to be with privately (e.g. joint activities in the evening), go on holiday together or discuss personal problems.