Groupscope: Instrumenting Research on Interaction Networks in Complex Social Contexts

Groupscope brings together 11 investigators from eight campus units and five colleges who propose to develop technologies to understand social interactions with a fidelity that enables break through social research. The project will employ advanced computing applications and technologies to capture, annotate, and analyze group interaction networks in complex social contexts. These technologies will address a major challenge faced by researchers studying the socio-economic consequences of decisions made by individuals acting in groups - the inability to collect high resolution, high quality, high volume interaction network data necessary to test and extend the science of group interaction networks. This complex methodology will implement sophisticated never-before-used models for interaction analysis which will enable researchers to contribute significant theoretical insights and practical applications in diverse yet socially significant areas such as disaster response and adolescent deviancy.

Principal Investigators:

• Feniosky Pena-Mora
  Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, UIUC
• Scott Poole
  NCSA and Department of Speech Communication, UIUC

Co-Investigators:

• Peter Bajcsy
  Image Spatial Data Analysis Group, NCSA, UIUC
• Nosh Contractor
  Speech Communication, Psychology and Coordinated Science Laboratory, UIUC
• Dorothy Espelage
  Child Development Division, Educational Psychology, UIUC
• Margaret Fleck
  Department of Computer Science, UIUC
• David Forsyth
  Department of Computer Science, UIUC
• Mark Hasegawa-Johnson
  Electrical and Computer Engineering, UIUC
• Caroline Haythornthwaite
  Graduate School of Library and Information Science, UIUC
• Klara Nahrstedt
  Department of Computer Science, UIUC
• Michael Pratt
  Business Administration, UIUC