Structural Analysis of Japanese Phone Traffic Space using Backward Calculated Distances

Abstract

In this paper, we discuss the tendencies of telephone call frequencies in Japan. In our analysis, we developed a new data-visualization method using backward-calculated distances from gravity model. The tendencies of the phone traffic data seem to follow the gravity model as a whole, but if we analyze details, the tendencies are very complicated. The reason might be influences of big cities or regional geographical features. We do not develop a model that explains the general phone traffic structure, but we develop a new method for visualizing the regional structre of phone-traffic. We use the gravity model as a basis, and using the concept of backward-calculated distance. Finally, the multi-dimensional scaling method is applied for visualizing the data. The concept of backward calculated distance was developed by Plane (1984), in analyzing the migration space. Our method is unique because we apply the backward calculated distance into multi dimensional scaling method. We calculated distances from non-constrained gravity model, and it enables us to analyze regional structure in many aspects simply. We analyze Japanese phone traffic data which is between 567 MAs'.