Abstract
Segregation can be regarded as the spatial separation of different population groups. Most
studies of segregation so far have relied on a spatial measures that are not effective to differentiate
different spatial distribution patterns among population groups. Spatial measures have
been introduced but have not been adopted widely because they are difficult to compute even
with Geographic Information Systems (GIS). However, it is still logical to employ GIS technology
to compute spatial segregation measures. A previous implementation attempt was
successful, but inefficient and suffered from several short comings. This paper describes a
recent effort to implement a set of spatial segregation measures in a GIS environment. An
integrative approach is adopted to take advantage of various recent advances in GIS technology.
Algorithms designed to implement spatial segregation measures consist of the general
procedures to extract spatial information from feature data and to combine spatial information
with attribute (population) data to derive the indices. Different types of spatial information
include geometric characteristics and spatial relationship of the areal units, and the
location information of the population. Using ArcView GIS and its Avenue programming
tool as an application example, computations of various spatial segregation indices were
implemented as additional functions in an ArcView user interface. # 2002 Elsevier Science
Ltd. All rights reserved.