Introduction and Background

Here, we will take a look at how different competancy areas relate to each other, and appear together in a person.

These competancy areas are based on CASEL 5.

What is CASEL?

The Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) is a trusted source for knowledge about high-quality, evidence-based social and emotional learning (SEL).

What is SEL?

Social and emotional learning (SEL) is an integral part of education and human development. SEL is the process through which all young people and adults acquire and apply the knowledge, skills, and attitudes to develop healthy identities, manage emotions and achieve personal and collective goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain supportive relationships, and make responsible and caring decisions.

Benefits of SEL

Learning about this is importance because according to CASEL "Research confirms and teachers, parents, and principals agree: Social and emotional competencies can be taught, modeled, and practiced and lead to positive student outcomes that are important for success in school and in life."

Tip: Read more about SEL’s impact here

About the Data

The data 1 is collected through a survey done which was answered by school and college students, which contained questions related to different aspects of the pillars defined by CASEL, like self awareness, grit, empathy etc.

The columns below refer to the questions in the survey.

display_all(data.head())
Age Gender How are you feeling right now? Why? What happened that is affecting your current mood? How many members are there in your household? ( Include Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Sisters-in-law, Nephews, Nieces, Siblings, etc., if they are living with you or next door to you. example: 2.0) Are you the only child? Are you the oldest child? Are you the youngest child? Do you have any pets? Say, you are playing a fierce game of badminton with your friends. Your mother keeps calling you from the balcony, asking you to come home and have your dinner. What will you do? Approximately how many people, whom you once knew well, do you now avoid, no longer meet, invite, or talk to? (Include anyone you have blocked on your Phone, Whatsapp, Facebook, Instagram, etc.) In the last three years, how many good friends have you made? ( don't include classmates, acquaintances you are not close to. ) How often have your parents discussed with you, your marks / school work / University subjects? Say during an exam, you momentarily show your answer sheet to a struggling friend. Your teacher decides to punish both of you. You and your friend are asked to bring your parents to School. What would you do in such a situation? How often do you check your social media? "I can easily tell how others are feeling." \nHow strongly do you agree with this statement? Say a popular group of boys and girls from your School or College are angry at your friend. Incidentally you are invited to a house party thrown by this group, but your friend is not invited. What do you usually do in such a situation? "When a best friend is angry, I feel angry too and take my best friend’s side." \nHow strongly do you agree with this statement? Say you move into a new high-rise apartment with a lot of amenities, like gym, swimming pool, clubhouses and you socialize with a few people. You hear gossip against a certain boy called Rohit, stating that he's not very popular amongst them. What would your approach be pertaining to Rohit? Which of these statements is true? Which of the following statements best describes you the night before the exam? After a failure/setback what do you do? In general, do you ask a lot of questions. How many? ( Googling, asking friends, parents or teachers) You are stuck on some level of competency on a new project. For example, you cannot finish 25 push-ups, find the bug in code, or cross a difficult level on a video game. What do you usually do? Say a friendly scientist from ISRO visits your school and talks about India's own mars-rover satellite "Mangalyaan". He invites students to come on stage after the presentation, to look at the robot closely and ask questions one-on-one. However, if you don't leave before this seminar ends, you will miss the bus back home and will have to walk all the way. What will you do? Are you self-taught in any of these skills? Say you find an error in a study book that your Professor has asked you to refer. What will you do? You overslept and are late for a terrace-top social event. What will you do? "I love public speaking, like in a classroom, Birthday party, Wedding, Team dinner, etc."\n\r\nHow strongly do you agree with this statement? Would you be friends with yourself? You have just overheard from your mother’s conversation, that your bunch of school friends are planning to throw a surprise birthday party for you, at your home. They will arrive in about 10 minutes. What will you do? Looking at your past incidents, how have you dealt with people who pass insulting personal comments at you? (Say someone makes fun of your looks, or calls you a loser) You get lower than expected grades. You lie to your parents but your sibling (or another relative) catches you and is now threatening to tell your parents. You are facing bullies at School/College Your sibling is permanently leaving home to a far-off place for a job or college, etc. Your pet is missing. Over the last decade have you experienced strong fear that causes panic, shortness of breath, a pounding heart, sweating, shaking, or dizziness? Are you able to control your restless mind from uninvited thoughts that unnecessarily slows you down? How do you describe your physical activity level? Around what time do you go to bed? How do you describe your quality of sleep? Where did you grow up? If the Government can spend on only one of the following, which would you choose? How close are you to nature? What is your view of the world today? You've just heard that your younger sibling (or closest friend) has not done well in an important exam. What would you do about this? How often do you laugh at yourself or make jokes on yourself to make others around you laugh or reduce tension in the environment? Does humor come to you spontaneously as a natural part of you? Everyday during commute, you see people violating traffic rules at a particular signal, and the cop there taking bribe and never managing the traffic. You have heard a lot about the entire system being corrupt. All this does not match the India of your dreams, and it saddens you. Looking at your past, what do you think you do in such a situation? When you have a 1-hour homework, how many breaks do you take? Are you generally happy? Are you always on time in reaching school, tuition, party etc? Describe your childhood by choosing 10 words or you can form 5 sentences.
0 15 Male Happy / Excited Its holiday 4 No Yes No False You affectionately tell your mother, that you ... 6 Hardly any Constantly Speak to your parents and explain the situatio... I don't have social media Disagree I will not go and not discuss this incident wi... Disagree Meet Rohit to find out what is so bad about him I'm happy even with a First Class I stay up late and revise through the night. I fight harder to reverse the situation, even ... Very few I will give myself a break and surely try agai... You will save the email of the scientist as sh... Riding bicycle I will immediately correct the literature with... I will freshen, do my hair, wear my new dress ... Neutral Certainly yes You tidy up your room, clean the restrooms, f... It affects me very deeply, I take a long while... 5 1 7 0 0 Never Rarely Low 11 PM Average Tier 2 Preserving the environment Frequently close with nature It is beautiful with many exciting opportuniti... Lighten their mood by asking them to party wit... Many I am usually mischievous, and humor doesn’t le... approach the cop and appeal to him/her peacefully A break every 15 minutes I am generally calm, peaceful and happy all th... Always on time I was a friendly and joyful guy
1 16 Female Calm / Peaceful Corona 12 No No No False You affectionately tell your mother, that you ... 0 Hardly any Constantly Speak to your parents and explain the situatio... Once in three hours Agree I will not go and not discuss this incident wi... Disagree Take the initiative to help Rohit make friends... I'm happy even with finishing exams I sleep early and revise in the morning. I fight harder to reverse the situation, even ... Very few I don’t give up easily. I will push myself unt... You will stay back to see the satellite at clo... Riding bicycle I will ignore my thoughts and trust the experi... I will freshen, do my hair, wear my new dress ... Disagree Certainly yes You skip freshening up, skip cleaning up the ... I ignore and avoid such people 4 6 9 10 9 Never Sometimes High 10 PM Poor Tier 2 Preserving the environment Sometimes close with nature It is becoming very selfish, dangerous and hop... Be with them for as long as they want your com... A few Sometimes, I get humorous thoughts and it make... approach the cop and appeal to him/her peacefully A break after 30 minutes I am generally calm, peaceful and happy all th... Always on time Beautifully
2 18 Male Calm / Peaceful Nothing. 8 No Yes No False You affectionately tell your mother, that you ... 0 Some Often Speak to your parents and explain the situatio... Once in hour Strongly Agree I will not go and instead spend the evening wi... Neutral Ignore the information and treat Rohit like yo... I'm happy even with a Distinction I sleep on time, wake up as usual and go for t... I keep moving. Many I don’t give up easily. I will push myself unt... You will stay back to see the satellite at clo... Riding bicycle, Cooking I will Google, ask a friend or reach out to th... I will leave only after I shower and ensure th... Strongly Disagree Certainly yes You attended to grandpa's usual call as you wa... I slam back with equally strong remarks. 3 4 5 5 0 Rarely Rarely Moderate 1 AM Good Metro (Tier 1) Preserving the environment Live closely with nature It is slowly going down Be with them for as long as they want your com... A crazy many I should be a stand-up comedian because I find... complain about this cop to multiple authoritie... I finish the homework at a stretch, without an... I am generally calm, peaceful and happy all th... Always on time Is this necessary? 🤔
3 19 Male Satisfied Not much 4 No Yes No False You affectionately tell your mother, that you ... 0 Some Sometimes Speak to your parents and explain the situatio... Once in three hours Neutral I will go, but I will encourage my friend to c... Strongly Disagree Ignore the information and treat Rohit like yo... I'm happy even with a Distinction I stay up late and wake up early again to revise. I keep moving. A crazy number of questions! I will give myself a break and surely try agai... You will miss the bus, and wait for your turn ... Riding bicycle, Swimming, Ice/Roller skating I will Google, ask a friend or reach out to th... I would just put on my shoes and run Agree Certainly yes You attended to grandpa's usual call as you wa... I ignore and avoid such people 8 5 9 4 0 Sometimes Very often Low 2 AM Poor Metro (Tier 1) Make our country modern, hi tech, and have bet... Sometimes close with nature Things are better than they used to be. Be with them for as long as they want your com... Many Sometimes, I get humorous thoughts and it make... I don't do anything about this I break a lot and usually take longer than an ... I feel I am generally calm, peaceful and happy... Sometimes on time Calm, learning, privileged, curious, wonderful
4 19 Female Sad / Down Life is not just happy 4 No Yes Yes True You affectionately tell your mother, that you ... 30 Very few Often Ask your friend and his/her parents to support... Once in hour Strongly Agree I will not go and instead spend the evening wi... Disagree Ignore the information and treat Rohit like yo... I'm happy even with a Distinction I stay up late and revise through the night. I spend time with people close to me and prefe... A crazy number of questions! I will give myself a break and surely try agai... You will miss the bus, and wait for your turn ... Cooking, Riding bicycle, Dancing, Playing musi... I will Google, ask a friend or reach out to th... I would just put on my shoes and run Strongly Agree Certainly yes You skip freshening up, skip cleaning up the ... I ignore and avoid such people 7 10 5 7 10 Very often Often High 12 AM Average Tier 2 Make our country modern, hi tech, and have bet... Live closely with nature It is becoming very selfish, dangerous and hop... Motivate them and tell them that it's not the ... A crazy many I am usually mischievous, and humor doesn’t le... drive carefully when you pass that signal and ... I break a lot and usually take longer than an ... I feel proud at times, but this feeling only l... Usually on time It was beautiful

Further processing was done on this data to make it usable for our models.

Analysis and Insights

Dendrogram

The following plot has been created by using a method called hierarchial clustering on the data. It shows how the answers to the survey questions are related to each other.

The diagram also has an attribute on the left side above each line, which refers to what the question signified. From this, it is possible to see which qualities are related to each other, and appeared together in this data.

To read this, we need to see which lines are joined to each other. The closer they are joined on the right, the more related they are.

As we can see, the 3rd and 4th line representing "Self Image" and "Intellectual Curiosity" are joined close to each other which means that they are appeared a lot together.

Another insight is that in the middle section with pink colour, we can see that "Anxiety" and "Inner peace" are related to each other, as one would expect.

Tip: Take a moment to go through the plot and understand it yourself!

Note: You can read more about Dendrograms here

Clustering Output

The following plot has been created by using a method called k-means clustering on the data after aggregating the data under different categories like "Anxiety", "Empathy", "Humour", etc. (These categories are mentioned on the right legend).

The 4 clusters that were formed shows that in our survey data, these characteristics appeared together.

We can see in the above plot, people in Cluster 1 had low empathy and compassion, were mostly male (encoded 1 in data), extroverted, and nature lovers amongst other things.

Like this, we can analize all the clusters.

Tip: Take a moment to go through the plot and understand it yourself!

Note: You can read more about clustering here

Conclusions

Warning: There’s a limitation on the front of data that more of it could have been collected with a diverse age range, thus these findings would be a little biased and might apply only to a subset of people.

Footnotes and Extras

1. The data can be found here.↩

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