A Study on the Significance of Spatial Interaction Model from the Urban Competitive Point of View

This study aims at finding relationships between the competitiveness of cities and the size or distance of them, based on some premises; (1) the competitiveness can be measured on the interval-ratio level, that is, factor scores, (2) a hypothesis that the spatial interaction model is valid for the relationships can be generally accepted. Based on the general recognition a research hypothesis that the more is the population or the nearer is the distance from a central city the higher is the competitiveness score is constructed. According to the premises 5-factor scores and composite score are calculated by means of regression method, and the scores are regressed on cities' populations and distances from Seoul city. Using bootstrapping method for the tests of significance is effective due to small sample of 21 cities. Results of the analyses show that most aspects of the hypothesis should be rejected or adjusted. Scores on Health-welfare factor, public service factor, and commercial vitality factor have no relation to the cities' sizes or distances. But the results also find the facts that the strong (negative) relationships exist between (1) educational base factor score and population, (2) density factor score and distance. Although this study improves systematic and analytic understanding of spatial interaction patterns, the understanding should be invalid for the general context because it has used the data on 21 cities in the capital region at the time of 2009.

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