A team of UVA Commerce faculty partnered with the DAC to explore how information about personal health and finance propagates on online platforms and influences decisions. The DAC developed for them a process to merge and standardize data from CoreLogic and ComScore, two sources of consumer and real estate information. The DAC assisted by developing a method to map real estate data to Designated Market Areas (DMAs), which are geographic regions where the population receives similar types of information through the media. The DMA mapping allowed the researchers to link consumer behavior in the real estate market with demographic characteristics. To make the data analysis more efficient, the DAC automated the data ingestion and analysis processes using high-performance computing. This project demonstrates how the DAC can assist faculty in tackling complex and socially relevant research questions using big data.

PI: Steven Johnson, PhD (UVA McIntire School of Commerce)

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