Using SimplyMap to Identify Relationships Between Variables
Inspired by a recent help desk ticket, we wanted to discuss how users may utilize SimplyMap to identify relationships between unique variables. For example, does having a college degree significantly impact the median income of areas? And how does median income effect spending on eating out? Let’s take a look at ZIP Codes within the state of North Carolina.
To quickly analyze a larger area by its smaller geographies, a Location Analysis Report is ideal.
Click on New Tabular Report > Location Analysis:
Choose the state of North Carolina, and navigate to the variables you would like to see compared and analyzed. In this example, we’ll use:
Household Inc, Median
% Education, College, Master's or Doctorate Degree, 2015
% Education, High School
Food away from home (Household Average)
# Households (HHs)
Once you’ve selected your variables, close out the Variables Panel and your report will be created. Be sure to select ZIP Codes from the Analyze Data By option that appears towards the top, shown below.
The last step is to choose a variable (column header) and Sort Descending. For example, if you sort descending for Median HH Income, you will get a ranked list (from high to low) of income by Zip Code. Scan the other columns to get a sense of education levels in these locations, and how much they tend to spend eating out.
Sort Descending Income Results:
Conclusion: The results yield that higher median income areas tends to also have a higher percentage of residents who have at least a college degree. The money spent eating out was somewhat surprising as results did not vary significantly in lower median income areas (although it did go down and especially in the very low income areas).
Note: You may also want to look at # Households or Population Totals in these areas as the averages and percentages would be impacted by those figures.
These results seem to verify a relationship that’s already well known and somewhat intuitive, however, with more than 60,000 variables in SimplyMap you could study relationships between Median Income and Whiskey Drinking, or Pet Ownership, or Yoga Participation, Transportation to work... the possibilities are endless. We’ll be sure to revisit this same topic in the near future!
More from SimplyAnalytics
Posted on Dec 11, 2015 by Admin
With the final week of the college football season in the books, and bowl game selections having just taken place, we wanted to search within SimplyMap to see if any data pertaining to co...
Posted on Aug 13, 2015 by Admin
In this quick SimplyMap report, we use Census data to help us identify which city in the United States has the highest percentage of residents who reported walking to work as their mode o...
Posted on Oct 26, 2018 by Admin
Welcome readers! This week we’ll take a look at how to browse for data by category in SimplyAnalytics. Browsing by Category is the default way of browsing for data in SimplyAnalytics. It ...
Posted on May 03, 2011 by Admin
The GRI team is very excited to announce the launch of SimplyMap 2.0! Completely redesigned, it is now easier than ever to access data and create professional quality thematic maps and re...
Posted on Jun 21, 2022 by Admin
Hello readers! We hope you’re having a great day. Today we are featuring 5 commonly asked questions about the American Community Survey dataset that’s available to all customers in Simply...
Posted on Oct 30, 2018 by Admin
We are pleased to be exhibiting at this year's 30th Annual Charleston Library Conference! The Charleston Vendor Showcase will be held Tuesday, November 6, 2018, from 10:30 a.m. to 6:00 p....
Posted on Mar 13, 2023 by Admin
Hello readers! Today, we’re excited to officially introduce the Location Query Report in SimplyAnalytics. The Location Query Report is a powerful feature in SimplyAnalytics that allows us...
Posted on Oct 22, 2008 by Admin
Excerpt from University of Iowa Library blog: In your marketing class, you may be developing a marketing plan for a pre-made meals restaurant specializing in vegetarian menus in Chicagola...
Posted on Jul 30, 2018 by Admin
Hello readers! Welcome to this week’s blog. This week we will feature the Related Data Table view and how you can use it to maximize your productivity in SimplyAnalytics. What is it? The ...
Posted on Jan 07, 2015 by Admin
In this week’s exploration of SimplyMap data, we set out to find which cities in the United States have the highest percentage of older houses. To determine this, we used the variable “% ...



