Racial-Ethnic Diversity: New Data Source Available
A newly expanded data portal for learning about community racial and ethnic diversity is now up and operational at the ‘Diversity and Disparities’ website of the Spatial Structures in the Social Sciences (S4) Initiative at Brown University. The portal shares data from an NIH-funded study completed this summer by department members Barry Lee, Professor of Sociology and Demography, Stephen Matthews, Professor of Sociology and Demography, Mike Martin, PhD candidate, and five other current or former Penn Staters. Census information compiled at the portal describes the racial-ethnic diversity of U.S. states, metropolitan and micropolitan areas, counties, and places (e.g., cities, suburbs, small towns) for the 1980-2010 period. This information can be accessed in three ways. A summary measure of diversity (the entropy index), panethnic group counts and proportions, and simple compositional graphics are available on a case-by-case basis via pull-down menus. The portal also features sortable lists and downloadable spreadsheet data files. While the spreadsheet files are intended for researchers, the pull-down menus and sortable lists may be useful for class assignments, fact-checking, or other purposes.
Click on https://s4.ad.brown.edu/projects/diversity/DiversityPages2/Default.aspx to go to the diversity portal’s home page.
Questions can be addressed to Barry Lee at bal6@psu.edu.
