Urban ecological differentiation and patterns of social visiting: a case study of St. John's, Newfoundland

Shrimpton, Mark (1975) Urban ecological differentiation and patterns of social visiting: a case study of St. John's, Newfoundland. Masters thesis, Memorial University of Newfoundland.

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Abstract

Studies of urban social differentiation have primarily adopted either a “structuralist”, macro-approach or a “behaviouralist” micro-approach to the delineation of sub-areas. In the former the objective is the spatial disaggregation of the city on the basis of the characteristics of the entire population, while the behaviouralist approach attempts an identification of sub-areas on the basis of common patterns of individual behaviour, attitudes and/or perceptions. This thesis consists of a structuralist analysis of the social differentiation of the city of St. John’s, Newfoundland, and an examination of the relationship between the dimensions of the differentiation so derived and one aspect of social behaviour, informal social visiting. As such it is a partial test of the assumption that structurally defined spatial units are also behavioural units, and of the degree to which locale is of importance to the social visiting behaviour of the populations of different sub-areas. - Description of the social differentiation of St. John’s is accomplished by an R-mode principal components analysis of thirty-nine census variables at the enumeration area scale. Despite this use of small area data the three classical dimensions of differentiation (socio-economic status, family status and segregation) emerge, with segregation based on religious differentiation. Other components extracted reflect participation in the labour force and housing. - Data on social visiting behaviour were gathered by a questionnaire survey of a sample of residents of twelve selected enumeration areas. Analysis of the patterns of social visiting reveals geographic distance to be a strong constraint on informal social interaction, even when the effects of variations in the distributions of potential contacts and the non-independence of geographic and social distance measures are minimized. Evaluation of the effects of social (factorial) distance is concentrated on the three main components extracted. Socio-economic and religious status differentiation are found to be significant constraints on social visiting. However, in the case of both geographic and social distance, it is found that there are systematic differences between their effects on the visiting behaviour of populations according to their social (factorial) characteristics.

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