Research project How do perceptions of the city inform neighbourhood selection and housing search?

This project examines whether and how ethnic differences in neighbourhood awareness and preconceptions perpetuate segregation by shaping the housing search behaviours of immigrants and natives in Uppsala. It uses a survey including a discrete choice experiment, apartment search data, register data, and qualitative interviews.  Segregation is often viewed as stemming from socioeconomic inequality, housing discrimination, and ethnic preferences. Yet, despite the slow moderation of prejudices, improvements in minority socioeconomic standing, and the enactment of anti-discrimination laws, residential segregation between different ethnic groups remains high. The emerging social structural sorting perspective attempts to explain the surprising durability of segregation, while complementing existing understandings of segregation processes. It builds on evidence that people not only lack complete knowledge of their residential options, but also that the knowledge they have is shaped by their ethnically segregated lived experiences and social networks. This leads people to exclude, in ethnically stratified ways, whole sections of cities from consideration before housing search begins, contributing to a self-perpetuating cycle of segregation. This project engages with the forefront of segregation research through one of the most comprehensive empirical examinations of social structural sorting to date. It will contribute with useful insights to tackle segregation and inequality in the city.