Human conceptions of spaces: Implications for GIS

Abstract

The way people conceptualize space is an important consideration for the design of GIS, because a better match with people's thinking is expected to lc:adto~ieJ"-~~: use information systems. &nyt/Izy SJ'I«. the basis to .GIS, .haS been -charaetCrizcd in ' . me lite~as being either small-scale (from table-top to #ooF--~,sPaces)ors cale (inside-of-buUding spaces to city-size spaces). While thiSdichoi:omyo~spacei{' grounded in the view from psychology that people's perception of space' spatial cognition, and spatial behaviour an: experience-based, it is.in cont:rastto Current GIS, which enable us to interact with large-scale spaces as though theywCrc .slDa1lscale or manipulable. We analyse difFerent approaehes to eharacterizing spaces and propose a unified view in which space is based onthephysica1 .properties of manipulability, locomotion, and size of space. Within the .struetureofour framework, we distinguish six types ofspaces: manipulable object space (smal1ert he human body), 7Il11I-mAnipu/4ble ,,6jea spti&e (greatCr than 'the,human bOdy, .b~i: less than the size of a building), mvirrmmmt:4lspaa(from inside-of-'building spaces to city-size spaces). PJf'I'Pbic sp.a (state. country, and ' continC:Ju -size sl'aces),' JNl1U"'IlmK SJNI&e (spaces perceived via scanning the lan~pe).andmap~e.Such a categorization is an important pan of Naive~'phy~asct()fthcorieson hoW" people intuitivdy or spontaDcowly eonceprualiee' geographic sp~aD((_~~· r because it has implications for various theorecicalarid methodologiaI q~6iis " concerning the design and use ofspatial information tools. OfparticularcOncemit he design of effective spatial information tools that lc:adto better communication."i' •

The Legibility and Permeability of Cities: Examining the Role of Spatial Data and Metrics

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ShopTalk: Independent Blind Shopping Through Verbal Route Directions and Barcode Scans

“…Because there is locomotion, the search space overlaps with the locomotor spaces. Our trichotomy may be appropriate for both sighted shoppers and visually impaired shoppers, and draws on the research by Freundschuh and Egenhofer (FE) [11] who provide a comprehensive review of the previous work on categorization of space.…”

“…Inspired by Barbara Tversky's research [10], we categorized different types of space within the shopping task in order to better understand the task. In our previous research with RoboCart [6,9], a robotic shopping cart for the shoppers with a visual impairment, we used the standard spatial dichotomy (locomotor vs haptic) from the blind navigation literature [11]. The locomotor space includes areas of large-scale movement around the grocery store.…”

Visualizing Stakeholder Perspectives for Reflection and Dialogue on Scale Dynamics in Social–Ecological Systems

“…Research and thought on human perspectives on space and time has a long history, initially in philosophers-for example, Heidegger (1962), Husserl (1964), and Kant (1965Kant ( /1781. Later, psychologies of time (Zimbardo & Boyd, 1999) and space (Freundschuh & Egenhofer, 1997) were developed more extensively. In social science, social systems are seen as partly disembedded from traditional notions of space and time (Giddens, 1990;Westley et al, 2002) and moreover, according to human geographers, spatial and temporal dynamics are shaped by changing power relations (Dahl, 1989;Ostrom, 1991Ostrom, , 1997Sayre, 2005).…”