Background

Our goal is to understand where children like to play in urban areas using Pairwise Comparison of play spaces

Method of Elo Ranking

Pairwise comparison is a popular ranking method often used in rating systems to compare and analyze study subjects in pairs to determine which one of the two is preferred. The standard Elo scheme we are implementing into our research will ultimately give us an end result of where children are more likely to play in our specific study areas.

There are many factors that will determine why children would rather play in one urban space than another. Such factors include safety, space, playground type, distance and travel time. Using the pairwise comparison method, users will directly compare two images side-by-side to determine the most desirable urban play space. Once results have been obtained from the pairwise comparison, they will be inputted into a ranking system best suited for our research.

Approach

Developing a python application...

Determining the most conducive urban space where children will engage in outdoor play is usually difficult to accurately research due to the various factors that affect different peoples’ perspectives. Developing a python function that implemented the Elo ranking method enabled us to rank various urban spaces in our study areas. Applying the Elo ranking method to our python function provided us with results to determine the winner and loser after each comparison.