EXPLORING SPATIAL FAMILIARITY*

Spatial familiarity is a natural language concept that has no well-defined technical interpretation. We explore here some possible dimensions of the concept, provide subjective measurements of the dimensions, and evaluate their independence. The four dimensions examined are locational knowledge, visual recognition, name identification, and interaction frequency. We suggest that both cognitive and behavioral dimensions are embedded in the concept of spatial familiarity and must be part of the meaning of the concept and of any attempt to make it operational.     

甘肃省入境旅游客源市场及发展对策研究

运用市场份额和亲景度指标,定量分析2000—2006年(2003年除外)甘肃省入境旅游客源市场的市场份额和亲景度的时空变化特征,并探讨了4种市场类型与4类亲景度市场的相关性,据此确定目前甘肃省入境旅游客源市场适宜发展的4类模式:重点市场、主要市场、潜在市场和机会市场,为甘肃省入境旅游客源市场定位和开拓提供科学依据,并提出甘肃省入境旅游发展的相关对策、措施。     

Effects of Task Demand and Familiarity with Scenes in Visuospatial Representations on the Perception and Processing of Spatial Information

This study examined the effects of task demand and familiarity on students' perception and processing of spatial information upon viewing visuospatial representations. Participants in South Korea were told that they would travel through an area, either drawing a map or observing the scenery depicted in photographs. The level of familiarity in the photographs was manipulated in three categories: neighborhood, Seoul (capital city of South Korea), and foreign cities. In two experiments, this study investigated students' eye movements, memory, and response sensitivity and bias. The results indicate that the participants in the map-drawing condition focused on structural information, such as routes, and that their memory of the scenes was more accurate. Moreover, the map-drawing group students were more sensitive and prudent in their responses. The increased level of familiarity also made students focus on structural information. The findings provide useful strategies for geography educators to use visuospatial representations.     

Understanding the spatial knowledge of freshmen and sophomores about their university campus: A case study from Jimei University,Xiamen, China

The influence of environmental familiarity on spatial knowledge development in the context of campuses and their surrounding environments has been well documented. However, existing studies have rarely stressed the distinction between the architectural styles of a campus and its surrounding environment. This study thus targets a campus with a historical architectural style that contrasts strongly with the surrounding modern environment, to gain a fresh view on how spatial knowledge develops with environmental familiarity on such a unique campus. This study recruited 30 freshmen and 28 sophomores to complete landmark selection, route sketching, and distance estimation tasks used to measure their spatial knowledge. The results mainly revealed that spatial knowledge developed by freshmen and sophomores stayed at a similar level as no significant differences were detected. As such, the key implication of this study is that spatial knowledge could be developed to the largest cognitive extent within a short period (i.e., 1.5 months) after students have entered a new campus in which the architectural style contrasts strongly with its surrounding environment. Increased environmental familiarity did not significantly promote their spatial knowledge development as sophomores with about an added year of campus stay performed similarly to freshmen.     

苏州国际旅游客源市场时空变化特征研究

运用亲景度和市场竞争态指标,定量分析1995—2004年苏州国际旅游客源市场亲景度和竞争态的时间和空间变化特征,并从时空角度探讨4类亲景度市场和4种市场竞争态的相关性,据此确定苏州国际旅游宜发展的4类市场:重点市场、主要市场、潜在市场和机会市场,并提出开拓苏州国际客源市场的建议。