Nowcasting Entrepreneurship: Urban Third Place versus the Creative Class

Researchers have long debated whether entrepreneurship policy should focus on place or people. In this paper, we extend the place-based versus people-based theories using contemporaneous and geographically granular web-user online activity data to predict a region’s proclivity for entrepreneurship. We compare two theoretical hypotheses: the urban third places—informal gathering locations—that facilitate social interaction and entrepreneurship, in contrast to the creative class which fosters entrepreneurial energy and opportunity in a region. Specifically, we assess whether business formation has a stronger statistical relationship with the browsing behavior of individuals visiting websites associated with third place locations—e.g., restaurants or bars—or the concentration of web browsing behavior associated with “the creative class”. Using U.S. county-level data, we find that both urban third places and the creative class can predict about 70% of the variations in regional business formation, with the creative class having a slight competitive edge.

Establishing and Testing a Quantitative Measure for Evolving Third Place Characteristics

Third places offer and promote social experiences beneficial for building interpersonal relationships. This study has two goals: 1) establish a scale that tests if an environment is characteristic of third place characteristics and 2) use this scale with four virtual environments (Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter) to test the proficiency of third place characteristics as representative of virtual third places. A research-informed scale was created and tested with a sample of 354 participants. Confirmatory factor analysis verified a nine-factor solution, with each subscale reporting acceptable reliability (range: .89 to .96). This scale was tested with 140 participants to verify if certain social media qualified as third places. MANOVAs revealed that Facebook adheres most closely to the majority of third place characteristics, followed by Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter respectively. The proposed scale can be used with other virtual environments to measure if they qualify as third places.

Expanding Oldenburg: A quantitative study of the association between perceptions of third places and social capital in Wellington neighbourhoods

<p>A neighbourhood with a well-designed and high-quality built environment has been shown to have a positive impact on residents’ physical and social wellbeing, and their overall quality of life. There is a plethora of research demonstrating how walkable, dense, connected, and mix land-use neighbourhoods improve people’s physical health however, empirical evidence supporting the built environment’s association with social well-being and social capital remains somewhat elusive. Interest in the relationship between walkability and social capital is growing momentum but considerations of other features of the built environment, such as third places remains sparse. Empirical assessments of the built environment and social capital have been conducted in Europe, North America or Australia, and studies of this relationship in a New Zealand context are almost non-existent. This thesis aims to address these gaps by investigating the association between residents’ perceptions of third places in their neighbourhood and two dimensions of social capital: sense of community (SoC) and neighbouring in three neighbourhoods in Wellington, New Zealand. Specifically, this thesis’ core objectives are to identify what types of places New Zealanders perceive as third places, the meaning and value they attach to third places, and to explore the association between SoC, neighbouring and people’s perceptions of third places. Data was obtained from a cross-sectional survey (n=160) and analysed using linear regression. Respondents most commonly perceive third places as either places of nature or as places that host activities and facilitate social interaction. For residents, it is important that third places are inclusive and accessible. The perceived quality of third places was significantly and positively associated with SoC. This relationship appears to be unaffected by demographic variables. The findings of this study provide scope for local policy makers and planners to provide for the presence of high-quality third places that are of nature or host activities to encourage social interaction between residents in new neighbourhoods.</p>

Expanding Oldenburg: A quantitative study of the association between perceptions of third places and social capital in Wellington neighbourhoods

<p>A neighbourhood with a well-designed and high-quality built environment has been shown to have a positive impact on residents’ physical and social wellbeing, and their overall quality of life. There is a plethora of research demonstrating how walkable, dense, connected, and mix land-use neighbourhoods improve people’s physical health however, empirical evidence supporting the built environment’s association with social well-being and social capital remains somewhat elusive. Interest in the relationship between walkability and social capital is growing momentum but considerations of other features of the built environment, such as third places remains sparse. Empirical assessments of the built environment and social capital have been conducted in Europe, North America or Australia, and studies of this relationship in a New Zealand context are almost non-existent. This thesis aims to address these gaps by investigating the association between residents’ perceptions of third places in their neighbourhood and two dimensions of social capital: sense of community (SoC) and neighbouring in three neighbourhoods in Wellington, New Zealand. Specifically, this thesis’ core objectives are to identify what types of places New Zealanders perceive as third places, the meaning and value they attach to third places, and to explore the association between SoC, neighbouring and people’s perceptions of third places. Data was obtained from a cross-sectional survey (n=160) and analysed using linear regression. Respondents most commonly perceive third places as either places of nature or as places that host activities and facilitate social interaction. For residents, it is important that third places are inclusive and accessible. The perceived quality of third places was significantly and positively associated with SoC. This relationship appears to be unaffected by demographic variables. The findings of this study provide scope for local policy makers and planners to provide for the presence of high-quality third places that are of nature or host activities to encourage social interaction between residents in new neighbourhoods.</p>

Being together, doing together and going forward together: echoes from France’s cultural third places in times of covid-19

In France, as in many other countries, cultural production and management practices are facing numerous transformations. Being understood as experimental; intermediary cultural spaces that redefine the relationship of culture with the public and the local territory, cultural third places provide a vivid example of this changing reality. Before the current health crisis, the social role of these constructs in regard to the local context were made even more visible. On a first level, this article aims to present the uniqueness of those spaces in the French context. Secondly, it describes the preliminary results of an exploratory study analyzing the reactions and adjustments to working dynamics of a number of spaces in the PACA region, in France, during the first months of the pandemic. Finally, we propose further lines of research.

Second Life of Third Places

One of the main characteristics of Oldenburg’s concept of Third Places is the condition of being a neutral space, friendly to everyone regardless of social status, age or gender. The concept, in its intended course, enables social activities that go beyond easily available cognitive prescriptions. Consequently, Third Places seem to play an important role in the process of formation of communities. They can be perceived as „places in between”; on the borderline of domestic intimacy and the imposed sterility of the workplace. There is an atmosphere of „freedom from” socialization and „freedom to” engage in relations with „familiar strangers” (Milgram, 1977). This essay aims to demonstrate the possibility of existence the virtual third places and present the argument that the way in which such social spaces develop and operate is a key factor in the implementation and functioning of virtual urban spaces. Self-determined social world Second Life will serve as an example.

Second Life of Third Places

One of the main characteristics of Oldenburg’s concept of Third Places is the condition of being a neutral space, friendly to everyone regardless of social status, age or gender. The concept, in its intended course, enables social activities that go beyond easily available cognitive prescriptions. Consequently, Third Places seem to play an important role in the process of formation of communities. They can be perceived as „places in between”; on the borderline of domestic intimacy and the imposed sterility of the workplace. There is an atmosphere of „freedom from” socialization and „freedom to” engage in relations with „familiar strangers” (Milgram, 1977). This essay aims to demonstrate the possibility of existence the virtual third places and present the argument that the way in which such social spaces develop and operate is a key factor in the implementation and functioning of virtual urban spaces. Self-determined social world Second Life will serve as an example.

An Update of Third Place Theory

Responding to a perceived decline in social capital in America, sociologists Oldenburg and Brissett offer the third place as a solution. While traditionally defined as social gathering places in the physical environment, recent studies have demonstrated that virtual environments may also serve as third places. This study analyzes the social media website Facebook to identify current socializing patterns. The goals of the present study are twofold: 1) to examine the characteristics of third places in virtual contexts as evidenced in existing literature and 2) to identify new third place characteristics that illustrate the evolution of third place characteristics using Facebook as a model. Findings provide support for updating third place characteristics in order to encompass both virtual and physical environments. Results reinforce the idea that present-day socializing trends better represent a different paradigm than existing theories and provide definitions for new evolving third place characteristics.