FAQ
In segregation: Entropy-Based Segregation Indices

knitr::opts_chunk$set(
  collapse = TRUE,
  comment = "#>"
)

data.table::setDTthreads(1)

# skip this vignette on CRAN etc.
BUILD_VIGNETTE <- identical(Sys.getenv("BUILD_VIGNETTE"), "true")
knitr::opts_chunk$set(eval = BUILD_VIGNETTE)

library("dplyr")
library("data.table")
library("tigris")
library("segregation")
options(tigris_use_cache = TRUE)
schools00 <- schools00

Can index X be added to the package?

Adding new segregation indices is not a big trouble. Please open an issue on GitHub to request an index to be added.

How can I compute indices for different areas at once?

If you use the dplyr package, one pattern that works well is to use group_modify. Here, we compute the pairwise Black-White dissimilarity index for each state separately:

library("segregation")
library("dplyr")

schools00 %>%
  filter(race %in% c("black", "white")) %>%
  group_by(state) %>%
  group_modify(~ dissimilarity(
    data = .x,
    group = "race",
    unit = "school",
    weight = "n"
  ))

A similar pattern works also well with data.table:

library("data.table")

schools00 <- as.data.table(schools00)
schools00[
  race %in% c("black", "white"),
  dissimilarity(data = .SD, group = "race", unit = "school", weight = "n"),
  by = .(state)
]

To compute many decompositions at once, it's easiest to combine the data for the two time points. For instance, here's a dplyr solution to decompose the state-specific M indices between 2000 and 2005:

# helper function for decomposition
diff <- function(df, group) {
  data1 <- filter(df, year == 2000)
  data2 <- filter(df, year == 2005)
  mutual_difference(data1, data2, group = "race", unit = "school", weight = "n")
}

# add year indicators
schools00$year <- 2000
schools05$year <- 2005
combine <- bind_rows(schools00, schools05)

combine %>%
  group_by(state) %>%
  group_modify(diff) %>%
  head(5)

Again, here's also a data.table solution:

setDT(combine)
combine[, diff(.SD), by = .(state)] %>% head(5)

How can I use Census data from `tidycensus` to compute segregation indices?

Here are a few examples thanks to Kyle Walker, the author of the tidycensus package.

First, download the data:

library("tidycensus")

cook_data <- get_acs(
  geography = "tract",
  variables = c(
    white = "B03002_003",
    black = "B03002_004",
    asian = "B03002_006",
    hispanic = "B03002_012"
  ),
  state = "IL",
  county = "Cook"
)

Because this data is in "long" format, it's easy to compute segregation indices:

# compute index of dissimilarity
cook_data %>%
  filter(variable %in% c("black", "white")) %>%
  dissimilarity(
    group = "variable",
    unit = "GEOID",
    weight = "estimate"
  )

# compute multigroup M/H indices
cook_data %>%
  mutual_total(
    group = "variable",
    unit = "GEOID",
    weight = "estimate"
  )

Producing a map of local segregation scores is also not hard:

library("tigris")
library("ggplot2")

local_seg <- mutual_local(cook_data,
  group = "variable",
  unit = "GEOID",
  weight = "estimate",
  wide = TRUE
)

# download shapefile
seg_geom <- tracts("IL", "Cook", cb = TRUE, progress_bar = FALSE) %>%
  left_join(local_seg, by = "GEOID")

ggplot(seg_geom, aes(fill = ls)) +
  geom_sf(color = NA) +
  coord_sf(crs = 3435) +
  scale_fill_viridis_c() +
  theme_void() +
  labs(
    title = "Local segregation scores for Cook County, IL",
    fill = NULL
  )

How can I compute margins-adjusted local segregation scores?

When using mutual_difference, supply method = "shapley_detailed" to get two different local segregation scores that are margins-adjusted (one is coming from adjusting forward, the other from adjusting backwards). By averaging them we can create a single margins-adjusted local segregation score:

diff <- mutual_difference(schools00, schools05, "race", "school",
  weight = "n", method = "shapley_detailed"
)

diff[stat %in% c("ls_diff1", "ls_diff2"),
  .(ls_diff_adjusted = mean(est)),
  by = .(school)
]