The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many countries to close their schools and to change their education system to adopt the learning from home (LFH) method, which arguably requires more direct involvement from parents to succeed. This study explored parent's attitudes toward LFH policy based on a survey of 261 participants from 16 provinces in Indonesia. Employing latent class analysis, we revealed three distinct groups of parents with unique compounds of attitudes toward LFH (i.e., disengaged, positive, and negative). Disengaged parents neither consider LFH useful, nor do they see it as demanding. In contrast, the other two groups of parents have quite the opposite views on the usefulness and demandingness of LFH. Further analysis using multinomial logistic regression revealed that older parents from low-income households tend to be disengaged while fathers of young children tend to have negative attitudes toward LFH. Interestingly, the ownership of a personal computer at home seems to be a key indicator of parents with positive attitudes toward LFH after controlling for other demographic factors. How the findings provide a firsthand insight on the existence of digital divide by highlighting the importance of access to personal computers at home is further discussed.
Homophily is one of the robust findings in social network studies. It persists even in a diverse population where the opportunity to develop homogeneous friendship is not greater than a mere chance and the process of developing heterogeneous friendship is facilitated. In this study, we introduce the Framework for Intergroup Relations and Multiple Affiliations Networks (FIRMAN), derived from social identity theory and social network framework, that can explain why that is the case. We begin by explaining its components: social identity space, social identity distance, length of ties, tie outreachability, and tie capacity. Then, through 7000 agent-based simulations, we demonstrate how the interaction of tie outreachability and tie capacity constraints heterogeneous friendship formations, which in turn make homophily inevitable even in a very diverse population. Surprisingly, the presence of even a small percentage (< 15%) of agents who can only develop homogeneous friendships can affect the whole population, preventing other agents from developing heterogenous friendships. We conclude by providing some directions for future research.
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