The Intimate Study Log

These daily notes for the last five months of The Intimate Study record how Miriam spent her time. The observations are quite variable in level of detail and quality. The objective was to note what Miriam was doing every half hour or hour. Lacunae exist (occasions where I was asleep or otherwheres) and even a day or two may have been missed. No analysis of these observations has been attempted here.

The notebook “Settings and Time Blocks” contains both sorts of information. The first, “Settings,” is merely a list of the environments in which we often found ourselves. These are presented below.

CATEGORIES OF SETTINGS

1. House and Environs
2. School-connected
3. Logo-centered
4. Miscellany

Extreme Examples

1.a Fernwood Drive
1.b Clyde Street Halfway to Warren
2.a Bus riding
2.b Visiting school friends at their homes
3.a Tech Coop and walking there
3.b Riding to MIT and back
4.a Baskin Robbins ice cream stores
4.b visiting family in Philadelphia

House and Environs: First cut
A. inside the house
B. inside the garage
C. the courtyard and drive
D. the near backyard: space trolly,monkey swing, all this side of barn
E. the far backyard: garden; tree fort and the Veranda
F. the courtyard and lawns
G. Inside the big house… mainly the playroom
H. Clyde street
I. Fernwood drive

School-connected: First cut

A Kindergarten classroom
B. Gymnasium
C. Playground
D. Library
E. Bus rides (general morning; KG home)
F. Other classes / hallways
G. Playgroup
H. Friends houses

Logo-centered: First cut

A. Children’s Learning Lab (in MIT Bldg. NE43)
B. Music room
C. Secretary’s office
D. Other offices in hall
E. Computer area
F. My office
G. Rest of 3rd floor in NE 43
H. 8th Floor AI lab
I. 9th Floor AI lab shop and offices
J. Cafeteria
K. Building 20-C
L. Tech Coop
M. MIT Campus

Miscellany: First cut

A. Connecticut scenes
B. Philadelphia places
C. Parents’ Boston friends’ homes
D. Outings
E. Playgrounds
F. Eating places

The “Time Blocks” comprise the daily logs of Miriam’s activities, based on a half hour sample, from May 9th through October 11, 1977. It is fragmentary in characters and necessarily incomplete, but the 160 pages of logs show a sufficiency of detail to document roughly how Miriam spent her time during the study. The material is hand written notes, of which scanned samples are presented below.
Time Block Samples – 1

Initial Format Description

Time Block Samples – 2

July 4th, 1977 (see also Vignette 40, Logo After Hours)

Time Block Samples – 3

October 8th, 1977 (last day of data)