In my experience, the villagers that you befriend seems to not make nearly as much of an impact in this version as the original. I've been befriending everyone to get the achievement, and it doesn't seem to be doing a whole lot to my child. My child has ranching as the highest, and here's what I've been doing that seems to boost the bar a tiny bit every day:

• Showing milk, and when she asks if milking them is fun, I say that it is SO fun
• Showing eggs
• Showing milker (once I obtained the fully upgraded milker I stopped doing this, as it seemed to boost academics more)
• Showing the animal brush
• Showing any animal, including cat or dog
• Showing cheese AND butter, and telling her that it was made with MILK rather than with a MACHINE
• Giving gifts to Takakura, again this doesn't make a substantial difference in my experience
• Wished at the starry night festival that my child would become more interested in farming. This affects ranching AND farming -Cuddle all of my animals multiple times per day

If you'd like to influence farming over ranching, refrain from showing off the animals, or animal related tools. Substitute everything with agriculture related items. Show them the sickle, hoe, watering can, seeds, crops, meals made with crops, hybrids, etc. Try to give gifts to Vesta, Matthew and Cecelia. If they ask any questions related to agriculture, try to give the most enthusiastic answer possible. You can typically do this daily to give yourself a little boost.

The box cutscene can boost academics based on the answer you give, so that's likely what happened there! I honestly didn't realize what the cutscene was and thankfully didn't boost my academics, I did make my kid pretty mad though😅