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Defining network boundaries is a key challenge in social network analysis. In our recent qualitative study of network influences on educational decision-making — based on interviews with 107 individuals from 16 case study networks — the set of members with whom interviews were secured in each case represented only a sub-set of the broader networks from which they were drawn. Following an introduction to our study and an outline of our approach, we consider some of the processes of filtering and selection that affected the specific composition of our network sample, and reflect upon what this tells us about the processes by which participants in network-based research make decisions about the representation of their networks within research contexts. We then explore the question of whether the partiality of our data actually matters, and conclude that it reflects the permeable, partial and dynamic nature of social networks, characteristics which are central to qualitatively-informed understandings of SNA.

The issue of arriving at agreement over outcomes in summative assessment of portfolios has been a major concern, given the complexity of the assessment task, the educational and political context, and the widespread and growing use of portfolios in higher education. This article examines research findings in this area. The discussion takes place in a philosophical and theoretical context. The first section of this article considers various approaches to portfolio assessment (e.g. positivist, interpretivist, feminist) and the assumptions underlying them. The second section examines research findings in these different traditions, pointing out the findings and gaps in each, as well as suggesting potential meeting points between them. The article does not argue that any approach offers all answers to all problems connected with agreement over outcomes in portfolio summative assessment. Rather, the purpose of this article is to clarify the choices facing assessors. The underlying issues raised here have relevance to other methods of assessment, apart from portfolios.

This paper explores whether and in what ways young people's perceptions and experiences of higher education (HE) can facilitate the transmission within their social networks of social capital both upwardly (from child to parent) and horizontally (from sibling to sibling), and thus can potentially provide bridging capital to family members, especially in families with little or no prior experience of HE. It utilises data from a project that explored the embedded nature of decision-making about HE amongst a group of 'potentially recruitable' adults and their wider networks. The study researched 16 networks, and the resultant sample of 107 individuals included six teenagers and 15 young people in their twenties. The paper concludes that, despite the general emphasis within existing theoretical approaches to network capital on the downward transmission of social capital, the educational experiences of younger generations can be critical in shaping the perceptions of other (including older) network members, albeit not always in ways that encourage formal educational participation.

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