Residential Segregation and Demographic Differentiation in Jeddah: A Spatial Analysis of Saudi and Non-Saudi Populations

Abstract

Residential segregation may coincide with differences in neighbourhood demographic composition, yet evidence at the neighbourhood scale in Jeddah remains limited. This study examined the spatial distribution of Saudi and non-Saudi residents and its association with demographic characteristics across 157 neighbourhoods, representing 3,713,313 residents in the 2022 Saudi census. Dissimilarity, isolation and exposure indices were calculated, alongside Pearson’s correlation coefficients, Local Indicators of Spatial Association (LISA) and Kruskal–Wallis tests. The dissimilarity index was 0.373, indicating an uneven but not completely separated residential distribution. Isolation indices were 0.628 for non-Saudis and 0.559 for Saudis, while the corresponding exposure indices were 0.372 and 0.441, respectively. LISA identified 24 High–High and 26 Low–Low neighbourhoods, together with three High–Low and five Low–High spatial outliers; the remaining 99 neighbourhoods were not statistically significant. The non-Saudi population share was negatively correlated with the proportion of children aged 0–14 (r = −0.780) and positively correlated with the proportion aged 15–59 (r = +0.702). Kruskal–Wallis tests indicated differences across LISA categories in age composition, dependency ratios and the ageing index (p < 0.001). These findings indicate that nationality-based residential patterns in Jeddah coincide with spatial clustering and distinct neighbourhood demographic profiles. The cross-sectional, aggregated data do not establish the causes of these associations, but combining citywide segregation indices with local spatial and demographic analyses offers a more detailed description of residential differentiation.