Uncovering the socioeconomic structure of spatial and social interactions in cities

TL;DR

This study uses mobile phone data to analyze how socioeconomic status influences spatial and social interactions in Chilean cities, revealing preferential interactions among similar socioeconomic groups and consistent patterns over time.

Contribution

It introduces a novel methodology to quantify socioeconomic-based spatial and social interactions using mobile data, addressing data scarcity issues.

Findings

People tend to interact with locations and individuals of similar socioeconomic status.

Socioeconomic proximity patterns are consistent across spatial and social interactions.

These interaction patterns persist at the city-to-city level.

Abstract

The relationship between urban mobility, social networks and socioeconomic status is complex and difficult to apprehend, notably due to the lack of data. Here we use mobile phone data to analyze the socioeconomic structure of spatial and social interaction in the Chilean's urban system. Based on the concept of spatial and social events, we develop a methodology to assess the level of spatial and social interactions between locations according to their socioeconomic status. We demonstrate that people with the same socioeconomic status preferentially interact with locations and people with a similar socioeconomic status. We also show that this proximity varies similarly for both spatial and social interactions during the course of the week. Finally, we highlight that these preferential interactions appear to be holding when considering city-city interactions.