2018 Degree of Urbanisation Variable

Created by a coalition of international organizations (the EU, FAO, ILO, OECD, UN-Habitat and the World Bank), the United Nations-endorsed Degree of Urbanisation variable is a single global method for classifying what is a city, an urban area or a rural area in any part of the world.

Because this single variable can be applied to any geographic area, it allows researchers to make international comparisons that were previously impossible because of the fragmented ways that countries have historically determined what "urban" means.

By overlaying the interview geotags against this geospatial layer, Gallup created a Degree of Urbanisation variable that Gallup data subscribers can download for free as a CSV file and integrate into the 2018 World Poll dataset.

This variable provides Gallup data subscribers with an unprecedented opportunity to explore the effect that urbanicity has on several of Gallup's core World Poll variables such as happiness, access to good jobs and people's desire to migrate.

Important Note: You must be a Gallup data subscriber to use this new variable.