Amy L. Griffin

Experimenting with Active Learning in Geography: Dispelling the Myths That Perpetuate Resistance.

While some geographers have embraced active learning as a means to engage students in a course, many others stick to conventional teaching methods. They are often deterred by suggestions that it can be difficult to implement active learning where students have no prior knowledge of a subject, that active learning requires too much work of lecturers and students, and that there are significant institutional constraints to implementing active learning. In this article the authors draw on their experiences of utilizing active learning in five different countries before dispelling myths which continue to constrain the uptake of active learning methods. Finally, they provide simple guidelines for successful integration of active learning in geography courses.

Embedding Research-Based Learning Early in the Undergraduate Geography Curriculum

This article considers the rationale for embedding research and enquiry skills early in the undergraduate geography curriculum and for making these skills explicit to students. A survey of 52 international geography faculty identified critical thinking, framing research questions, reflectivity and creativity as the most challenging research skills to teach early in the undergraduate curriculum. This article provides a range of practical examples illustrating research skill teaching from geography courses internationally. The case studies demonstrate that by embedding research skill development early, scaffolding provided throughout a degree programme can support geography students as they become producers of knowledge.

Social vulnerability in the context of bushfire risk at the urban-bush interface in Sydney: A case study of the Blue Mountains and Ku-ring-gai local council areas

In the recent past, Australia has experienced several catastrophic hazard events and the frequency and intensity of such events is expected to increase in the future. Natural hazards can rarely be fully prevented, yet their losses can be minimized if the necessary preparedness and mitigation actions are taken before an event occurs. Identification of vulnerable groups is an important first step in any preparedness and emergency management planning process. Social vulnerability refers to population characteristics that influence the capacity of a community to prepare for, respond to and recover from disasters. Factors that contribute to social vulnerability are often hidden and difficult to capture. This study analyzes the relative levels of social vulnerability of communities at the urban–bush interface in the Blue Mountains and Ku-ring-gai local council areas in New South Wales (NSW), Australia. We tested whether a standardized social vulnerability index could be developed using a pre-existing set of indicators. We created an exploratory principle component analysis model using Australian Bureau of Statistics 2006 census data at the Census Collection District (CCD) level. We identified variables contributing to social vulnerability and used the component scores to develop a social vulnerability index. Finally, the social vulnerability index was mapped at the CCD level. Our results indicate that both contributors to and the level of social vulnerability differ between and within communities. In other words, they are spatially variable. They show different spatial patterns across the areas, which provides useful information for identifying communities that are most likely to experience negative disaster impacts due to their socio-demographic characteristics.

User studies in cartography : opportunities for empirical research on interactive maps and visualizations

ABSTRACT The possibility of digital interactivity requires us to reenvision the map reader as the map user, and to address the perceptual, cognitive, cultural, and practical considerations that influence the user’s experience with interactive maps and visualizations. In this article, we present an agenda for empirical research on this user and the interactive designs he or she employs. The research agenda is a result of a multi-stage discussion among international scholars facilitated by the International Cartographic Association that included an early round of position papers and two subsequent workshops to narrow into pressing themes and important research opportunities. The focus of our discussion is epistemological and reflects the wide interdisciplinary influences on user studies in cartography. The opportunities are presented as imperatives that cross basic research and user-centered design studies, and identify practical impediments to empirical research, emerging interdisciplinary recommendations to improve user studies, and key research needs specific to the study of interactive maps and visualizations.

Comparing Color and Leader Line Highlighting Strategies in Coordinated View Geovisualizations

In most coordinated view geovisualization tools, a transient visual effect is used to highlight observations across views when brushed with a mouse or other input device. Most current geovisualization and information visualization systems use colored outlines or fills to highlight observations, but there remain a wide range of alternative visual strategies that can also be implemented and compared to color highlighting to evaluate user performance. This paper describes the results of an experiment designed to compare user performance with two highlighting methods; color and leader lines. Our study methodology uses eye-tracking to capture participant eye fixations while they answer questions that require attention to highlighted observations in multiple views. Our results show that participants extract information as efficiently from coordinated view displays that use leader line highlighting to link information as they do from those that use a specific color to highlight items. We also found no significant differences when changing the color of the highlighting effect from red to black. We conclude that leader lines show significant potential for use as an alternative highlighting method in coordinated multiple view visualizations, allowing color to be reserved for representing thematic attributes of data.

Applications of Signal Detection Theory to Geographic Information Science

Abstract Signal detection theory (SDT) is a framework used by psychologists to study decision making under uncertain conditions. While we often know a great deal about how different methodological choices can affect the outcome of an analysis, we know less about how information end users interpret and understand competing outcomes in the context of the decisions they are trying to make. We contend that such information would be useful and assert that SDT analysis is one method of building this understanding. We provide an introduction to SDT methods and an example of the methods applied to a navigation experiment, discuss why SDT may be useful for GIScientists, and provide several examples of other potential application areas.

Envisioning the future of cartographic research

ABSTRACT This article introduces a special issue of the International Journal of Cartography that envisions the future of cartographic research. Following a process of collaborative ideation among International Cartographic Association (ICA) commissions, their members and other allied scholars and professionals, five articles have been crafted to highlight challenges and opportunities for cartographic research in the decades ahead. The first article characterizes the evolution of cartographic research through analysis of the activities of the ICA. Next, we present four new research agendas on persistent problems in cartographic research, big data and geovisual analytics, designing across map use contexts and use and user issues.

GeoViz: interactive maps that help people think

This issue of IJGIS showcases research activities related to how map displays can support users in visuospatial decision making for solving complex spatiotemporal problems. It represents a selection of the contributions made to a dedicated scientific workshop organized by the International Cartographic Association (ICA) Commissions on Geovisualization and Cognitive Visualization. The workshop was held over 3 days, from 6–8 March 2013, at HafenCity University in Hamburg, Germany. Sources of spatial data abound. Some spatial data are well-structured, some are messy, and others are streaming in at fast rates. Some data sets are so large that they have been creatively termed ‘big data’. Analysing and synthesising these messy, large and fast changing data sets to produce meaningful insights about phenomena and processes provides both computational and cognitive challenges. While computers can provide answers, people are required to make these answers meaningful. At the same time, the world faces significant problems that are affecting or will soon begin to affect our daily lives: food security, climate change and environmental hazards, traffic congestion, economic crises and biodiversity, amongst others. But both computers and people can do amazing things when tasked with a challenge. These amazing things, however, do not arise out of nowhere. They require a concerted effort to design interactive analytical cartographic representations of these messy, big and potentially rapidly changing data sets; representations that can effectively support spatiotemporal inference and decision making by people (Andrienko et al. 2010). Thus there is a need to bring together researchers who can contribute to our understanding of how technology, people and spatial representations of information work effectively together to solve the world’s pressing problems. The specialist workshop brought together 76 researchers from 18 countries working on the design, implementation and evaluation of interactive analytical cartographic representations. The workshop programme was derived from 44 submissions, and included 36 presentations grouped into 12 sessions of regular talks presenting mature research, minitalks presenting works in progress, and Birds of a Feather discussions about emerging topics such as uncertainty visualization and the use of colour. Based on the reviews of submitted extended abstracts and presentations at the workshop, the guest editors invited authors of the 10 most highly ranked regular presentations to submit full articles to this special issue. Each submission was reviewed by two to three external reviewers and the guest editors to protect anonymity of reviewers. The guest editors handled contributions by two of the conference co-organizers separately, to assure a fair and transparent review process. After several rounds of reviewing, five articles have been accepted for the special issue. These articles exemplify current research directions in geovisualization. We are very grateful to the reviewers and the authors for their diligent and extremely efficient work. It is notable that the reviewers not only critiqued the articles but also gave concrete recommendations to the authors for their improvement through revision. Turdukulov and colleagues describe a novel algorithm for detecting flock patterns in trajectory data sets. The proposed algorithm uses transaction-based data representations of International Journal of Geographical Information Science, 2014 Vol. 28, No. 10, 2009–2012, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13658816.2014.937719

Designing across map use contexts: a research agenda

ABSTRACT The explosion of map use in the past few decades as part of everyday activities, accelerated through the digital production and dissemination of maps and the availability of low-cost, location-aware devices, has made the job of cartographers and map display designers more challenging. Yet, how do these recent changes affect effective map design? Can we accurately predict which designs will work for a given context? We investigate the concepts of design transferability and context and their potential to help us create map design outcomes that are effective for varying map use situations. We then present a model for operationalizing map use context to support evaluating map design transferability and pose several open research questions that need to be answered to support operationalizing map use context. This is followed by a research agenda that identifies research opportunities related to key research needs that will underpin transferable map design.

Impacts on the Urban Environment: Land Cover Change Trajectories and Landscape Fragmentation in Post-War Western Area, Sierra Leone

An influential underlying driver of human-induced landscape change is civil war and other forms of conflict that cause human displacement. Internally displaced persons (IDPs) increase environmental pressures at their destination locations while reducing them at their origins. This increased pressure presents an environment for increased land cover change (LCC) rates and landscape fragmentation. To test whether this hypothesis is correct, this research sought to understand LCC dynamics in the Western Area of Sierra Leone from 1976 to 2011, a period including pre-conflict, conflict, and post-conflict eras, using Landsat and SPOT satellite imagery. A trajectory analysis of classified images compared LCC trajectories before and during the war (1976–2000) with after the war (2003–2011). Over the 35-year period, the built-up land class rapidly increased, in parallel with an increase in urban and peri-urban agriculture. During the war, urban and peri-urban agriculture became a major livelihood activity for displaced rural residents to make the region food self-sufficient, especially when the war destabilised food production activities. The reluctance of IDPs to return to their rural homes after the war caused an increased demand for land driven by housing needs. Meanwhile, protected forest and other forest declined. A significant finding to emerge from this research is that landscape fragmentation increased in conjunction with declining forest cover while built-up areas aggregated. This has important implications for the region’s flora, fauna, and human populations given that other research has shown that landscape fragmentation affects the landscape’s ability to provide important ecosystem services.