The Effect of the Meaning and Experience of Place on Mapping Behaviour

Abstract

This thesis researches the role of platial connection and personal demographic and geographic characteristics on an individual’s mapping behaviour. Recently, individuals increasingly use their geographic voice by participating in crowd-sourced and voluntary geographic data collection and visualisation. Simultaneously, there is a demand for better understanding places and how the meaning of place can be portrayed in maps. By investigating the connection of mapping behaviour as influenced by the extent to which people feel a platial relationship, the understanding of individual influences on mapping initiatives can be understood better, together with gaining insights in how to research mapping behaviour.

A self-administered online questionnaire including interactive mapping exercises was carried out. Participants performed mapping exercises of five secondary schools (of which they attended one; three schools inside Eindhoven, two outside Eindhoven) by tracing the geometry on aerial images of the area they saw as belonging to that place. The mapped area size, number of placed nodes and time spent on the exercise constitute the variable ‘mapping behaviour’. Questions relating to the personal relationship with those places were also included, together with personal demographic and cartographic questions. The data was analysed quantitatively through linear mixed effect models and qualitatively. Schools were chosen to portray ‘locational familiarity’, places that cause relationships based on the location instead of their thematic function.

This study showed that the personal platial relationships with specific places do affect the way individuals map these places, both quantitatively (in ways of included areas, time spent on mapping and the usage of nodes) and qualitatively through used language. The personal demographic and geographic characteristics are of less impact and require further study to rule out their significance. Due to the limitations of the available cartographic research tools for designing mapping experiments and the limited data sample, future research can add on this exploratory study by looking into additional mapping behaviour variables and the inclusion of different types of places that allow for parametric sampling.