Goodness of figure and social structure.

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the relative "goodness of figure" of structures having some resemblance to the linear ordering. Completely connected structures made of asymmetric relations tend toward the linear ordering and produce strain to the extent that they depart from it. The Kendall and Smith coefficient of consistency is proposed as an index of departure from the linear ordering, and predicts ease of learning very well in an experiment in which 5s learned social structures based on the relation "influences." The coefficient is modified to deal with incomplete structures and structures composed of both symmetric and asymmetric relations. Reanalysis of previously published data demonstrates that the modified coefficient powerfully predicts ease of learning of various such structures.In writing of conceptual good figure, De Soto and Albrecht (1968b) suggest that there are laws of conceptual organization analogous to the more familiar laws of perceptual organization investigated by the Gestalt psychologists and subsequent workers. The linear ordering and the simple grouping are offered as examples of conceptual good figure. In this paper we would like to pursue further the idea of good figure as applied to structures having some resemblance to the linear ordering, with particular emphasis on the direction of relations. We wish to develop a method for dealing with such structures in the way consistency theory, and especially structural balance theory (Cartwright & Harary, 1956), has dealt with structures which tend toward the grouping.Cartwright and Harary introduced the specification of direction of a relationship into balance theory, but, in general, balance theory has been more concerned with the

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