Residential propinquity as a mediator of ethnic assortative mating

Propinquity—the tendency to form social bonds with those who live nearby—is a key mechanism through which ethnic segregation can give rise to ethnic endogamy—the formation of romantic unions between partners with the same ethnic group membership(s). In this paper, co-authored with Jesper Lindmarker, we use discrete choice models applied to Swedish register data to quantify the degree to which propinquity, assessed using distances between singles and potential partners, mediates ethnic endogamy in partner choices. We find that propinquity accounts for up to 20% of ethnic endogamy, depending on the group. The mediation effect is strongest for the most segregated groups.