In 1978, Anne Dewitt Watts examined the PARC and ARC definitions of the region to assess the extent to which “the two major sets of variables used to define the region—socio-economic characteristics and physical characteristics—correlate with each other” (Watts 19).
Watts’s “homogeneous region” includes all counties with mountainous or rugged terrain AND Appalachian socioeconomic characteristics. This region retain non-mountainous counties if they are largely surrounded by the region and exhibit the socioeconomic characteristics listed above (34).
From Ann DeWitt Watts, “Does the Appalachian Regional Commission Really Represent a Region?,” Southeastern Geographer 18 (1978): 19- 36.
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