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Editor:
Tonya Allen
allen@pop.psu.edu
PRInformation
Spring 2009
Note from the Director
Recent years have seen rapid growth in interest in the addition of a spatial perspective to population research. This growth has been driven in part by the ready availability of geo-referenced data and the tools to analyze and visualize them: geographic information systems (GIS), spatial analysis, and spatial statistics. PRI's Geographic Information Analysis (GIA) Core, which was established in 1996, provides services to support PRI researchers in the use of geospatial data, GIS methods and spatial statistics. Researchers can access expert advice and assistance with mapping/cartography (publications, Websites, presentations), geocoding (address matching), contextual database and ecological dataset creation, geospatial data archiving and management, geospatial data acquisition, spatial statistics applications, custom programming, and GIS training.
GIA Core services are used at discrete stages of research projects and occasionally over the lifetime of a project--from sampling and data collection to data manipulation and contextual data construction to mapping and spatial analysis. Two very different projects exemplify the potential contributions of the GIA Core in the early stages of a research project. The GIA Core has supported the early phases of the National Children's Study in the Westmoreland County, PA site (Carol Weisman's NICHD/U. of Pittsburgh subcontract which includes Marianne Hillemeier and Stephen Matthews as co-investigators). Specifically, the GIA Core has assisted the Westmoreland research team by geocoding birth records, building basic contextual data, producing maps, and informing stratification and segment identification. In the second example, the GIA Core provided assistance in scanning and digitizing historic maps from 1881 and 1901, linking census, vital registry and valuation rolls, and in building geodatabases for a project headed by James Wood and Patricia Johnson on Spatiotemporal Dimensions of Population Change in Northern Orkney (NSF-HSD grant award). Currently, the GIA Core is working with Wood to develop a user-friendly public access database for the project.
The GIA Core has also worked on several projects involving methodological developments. The most visible project in this regard is the Measuring Spatial Segregation project, a methodology award from NSF to former colleague Sean Reardon (Stanford) and Matthews, Barrett Lee and Glenn Firebaugh. The project made available a beta-release of SpatialSeg, a Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) code implemented in ESRI's ArcGIS 9.x that calculates spatial and aspatial segregation measures based on Theil's information theory index. The GIA Core staff completed model runs for both race/ethnic and income segregation in the top 100 metropolitan areas in the US for 1980, 1990 and 2000. Published papers from this project have appeared in Demography (2008), American Sociological Review (2008), and Social Science Research (2009).
PRI faculty members have drawn on GIA Core services in pilot projects and in new grant submissions. These include studies on incarceration and health (Michael Massoglia), child health disparities (Rhonda BeLue), immigration and child health (Nancy Landale, Jennifer Van Hook, Gordon F. De Jong, Michelle Frisco, Deborah Graefe, Marianne Hillemeier, Molly Martin, and R.S. Oropesa), television and family change (Rukmalie Jayakody) and system science applications to studying health needs along the Rio Grande (Rachel Smith). Smith is also collaborating with Jill Findeis in several studies based in Mozambique. Several studies in Africa are exploring the use of geospatial data and technologies in fieldwork and analysis, including projects led by Francis Dodoo and Jeffrey Bingenheimer in Ghana. Looking to the future, the GIA Core is developing close working ties with PRI affiliates in the Hershey Medical Center and developing ties to new faculty at Penn State such as John Iceland (diversity, segregation, residential attainment and neighborhood change), Katerina Bodovski and Emily Greenman (parental practices, student achievement and neighborhood effects) and Lori Burrington (neighborhood context and health).
Training in the use of GIS, spatial analysis, and spatial statistics has been a focus at PRI for several years. A new R25 on Advanced Spatial Analysis Training was awarded to Matthews in June 2008. This training program is based on residential workshops (two per annum), augmented by extensive Web resources specific to the advanced spatial analysis methods to be covered. Workshops focus on geographically weighted regression, spatial econometrics, multi-level and spatial modeling, and spatial pattern analysis. Workshops on Bayesian spatial modeling and agent based modeling are planned for the future. The workshops are led by eminent researchers, include guest speakers, provide opportunities for participants to work with their own data, support the interaction of presenters and attendees, and foster peer-to-peer collaboration among attendees through small-group discussions and attendee presentations. Through our GIS training, we hope to extend our contributions to population research using a spatial perspective beyond Penn State.
Nancy Landale
Director
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