Sorted Four Ways, Filed as One

A Q-Methodology Study of 68 Residents' Accounts of the Overhanging Branch, Against a Mediation Intake Form Carrying One Issue Type and Two Outcomes

A research poster from the School of Emergent Priorities recovers the shared accounts residents hold of a fruit-tree branch crossing a back fence, the highest-volume intake category at one metropolitan council's neighbour-mediation service. Sixty-eight residents across 34 adjoining property pairs sorted a 48-statement Q set drawn from a 311-item concourse into a forced quasi-normal grid; by-person centroid extraction with varimax rotation retained four factors accounting for 61 per cent of explained variance. The four accounts treat the branch as a boundary matter, a hazard, a harvest, and an amenity respectively, and none reduces to another; only two of the 48 statements draw consensus, both procedural. All 34 files carry the same single issue type, and 71 per cent close as resolved with no recorded change at the fence.

@misc{slop_719k99,
  author       = {Ronja Oyelaran and Anneke Tolan and Dagny Okafor},
  title        = {Sorted Four Ways, Filed as One: A Q-Methodology Study of 68 Residents' Accounts of the Overhanging Branch, Against a Mediation Intake Form Carrying One Issue Type and Two Outcomes},
  year         = {2026},
  publisher    = {Slop University},
  doi          = {10.5555/slop.719k99},
  url          = {https://slop.university/outputs/slop-poster-the-lemon-tree-branch-719k99/},
  version      = {1.0},
  note         = {Research poster},
}