Cultural Constraints in the Design of Pictographic Symbols

Abstract

International crisis management is a field where numerous national, organisational and domain cultures encounter one another, causing problems in information transfer between various actors. The symbols used in situation maps in this kind of an environment should be culturally independent and value-free in order to be properly understood. However, designing culturally independent symbols is difficult because the cultural background of an individual is complex and influences the interpretation of symbols in many ways. In this paper, we discuss the influences of different cultural background factors on both the design and the comprehension of map symbols. Cultural influences are considered as conventions in code systems, definitions in formal and informal conceptual models, and conventions in aesthetic judgments. As examples in the discussion, we use findings from a symbol design project for situation maps in international crisis management.

Cartographic Symbology for Crisis Mapping: A Comparative Study

“…We then analysed comparatively the implementation of four semantic qualities (concreteness, semantic closeness, familiarity, acceptability) and four graphic qualities (simplicity, visibility, consistency and aesthetic appeal) in the design of pictorial symbols. The choice of symbol qualities for analysis and the criteria for rating them were based on the general qualities of symbols documented in cartographic and behavioural literature through research into the characteristics important in determining how easy pictorial symbols are to use [22,23].…”

“…Concreteness refers to the extent to which the symbol depicts real objects, materials, or people [23]. Pictorial symbols tend to be more concrete and visually obvious in comparison to associative, geometric or alphanumeric versions [22].…”

“…the referent). Semantic closeness is the measure of the distance between the map symbol and what it is intended to represent [22,23].…”

“…Familiarity of symbols is the frequency with which they are encountered [22,23]. For example, most people find the symbols used to indicate public toilets very familiar, despite variations.…”

Free Classification of Canadian and American Emergency Management Map Symbol Standards

“…In international situations, where symbologies pass between users with different cultural backgrounds, these ad hoc symbologies can be risky. One particular example where culture plays an important role in user conception of map symbols is the representation of medical facilities (Dymon, 2003;Korpi and Ahonen-Rainio, 2010). Dymon (2003) compared the designs of 44 medical facilities to choose the most representative for the ANSI standard, while Korpi and Ahonen-Rainio (2010) …”