Gender Differences in the Sketch Map Creation Process

Abstract

Gender differences in navigation and mapping skills have long been noted in past research. Females tend to use landmarks for navigation while males favour paths and co-ordinate systems. Similar findings are found in sketch maps, where landmarks are prevalent on female maps and males draw more paths. Although the type and quantity of map elements give an indication of gender differences, there is potential for further insights to emerge from analysis of the process or sequence in which map elements are drawn. The sequence provides detail on when in the drawing process gender differences or similarities in map elements arise.This study found that in the initial drawing of the map, there were few gender difference in the number of landmarks and paths drawn. However, females drew a larger proportion of landmarks and males drew more paths from 10% to 25% into the drawing process. Thereon until half way through, no statistical differences were found. Differences were seen again in the last half of the drawing process. Overall, females drew more landmarks and paths than men, but the difference lay in when clusters of these map elements were drawn.

Exploring youth socio-spatial perceptions of higher education landscapes through sketch maps

“…Such approaches are often referred to as "sketch mapping" and are in many cases represented digitally in GIS (Cieri, 2003;Comenetz, 2005;Coulton, Chan, & Mikelbank, 2011;Dennis, 2006;Hawthorne et al, 2006;Huynh, Doherty, & Sharpe, 2010;Knigge & Cope, 2006;López & Lukinbeal, 2010;Pavlovskaya, 2002;Tu Huynh & Doherty, 2007;Wridt, 2010). Boschmann and Cubbon (2014) highlight that mental maps drawn largely from memory are quite different from sketch maps.…”

A Systematic Review into Factors Influencing Sketch Map Quality

“…Some authors state that women draw more roads than men [72,133], while others state the opposite [76,134,135]. Still others claim that the sketch maps of men and women do not differ in any way [70]. It therefore seems that content frequency is influenced by factors other than sex.…”

“…Studies count the frequency of objects within pre-set categories. The most frequent sorting method involves categorisation based on geometrical shapes [10,[70][71][72] or on the thematic classification of objects [9,73]. Some studies consider only the overall frequency of the drawn objects [74][75][76].…”

Mental map as a tool and an object of research in geographical education

“…Mezi dalšı́ identifikované faktory, které u zkoumané skupiny žáků ovlivnily četnost zakreslených prvků (naplněnost mentálnı́ mapy), patřily pohlavı́ respondentů a jejich známka ze zeměpisu. Rozdı́ly v naplněnosti mentálnı́ch map mezi chlapci a dı́vkami potvrzujı́ i výzkumy Novotná, Bláha (2012) a Huynh, Doherty, Sharpe (2010, kteřı́ však dodávajı́, že rozdı́ly mezi pohlavı́mi existujı́, ale nejsou nijak výrazné. Dalšı́mi významnými edukačnı́mi činiteli, které napomáhajı́ vytvářet mentálnı́ mapu žáků, jsou kartografické produkty (Kitchin, Blades 2002).…”