Spatial Concept Perspectives

We have gathered ~300 excerpts from published works about fundamental spatial concept terms. These have been cross-referenced with the concept lexicon appearing on the left. Those terms were drawn from the U.S.National Science Education Standards (NSES 1996) for topic areas B - Physical Science, C - Life Science, D - Earth and Space Science, as well as from the 1994 U.S. Geography Teaching Standards for grades 9-12. Those standards can be browsed here.

spatial concept terms

disciplinary perspectives on "distance"

distance

The effectiveness of the teacher's voice falls with distance. Distance, or separation, is fundamental geographical property also. intensity of communication falling off continuously with distance is a property shared by many, but not all, phenomena. An example of the opposite effect of distance is a transportation cost which normally rises with distance. Other phenomena are invariant with distance- at least within some range. Legal jurisdiction is as binding at the borders of a state as in its center.

Geography

Nystuen (1963)

Identification of some fundamental spatial concepts

distance

As soon as occurrences are given the property of location or as soon as a bounding frame of reference is defined, the concept of distance emerges. Distance is regarded as the interval between the locations of occurrences. When location is well specified, distance becomes a precise concept (e.g., by determining the interval between coordinates). As location becomes less clearly specified, distance becomes less exact and more fuzzy (e.g., X is West of Chicago while Y is North of Dallas).

Geography

Golledge (1995)

Primitives of Spatial Knowledge

distance

Relationships between places defined by their proximities (e.g., relative location, Euclidean and non-Euclidean metrics, distances in rasters, buffers, multidimensional scaling, weight matrices, and social distances.

Geography

de Smith, et al. (2008)

Geospatial Analysis: A comprehensive guide to principles, techniques, and software tools

distance

The ability to reason from knowledge of relative position. Distances define relationships between places by measures of proximity.Examples include relative distances (e.g., relative location based on Euclidean and non-Euclidean metrics), distances in rasters, buffers, multidimensional scaling, weight matrices, and social distances.

Social Science

Janelle and Goodchild (2011)

Concepts, Principles, Tools, and Challenges in Spatially Integrated Social Science

distance

When two or more (objects) are considered within measurable geographic space, additional spatial relationships can be observed. In (b), size, shape, place, and containment continue to exist for each box, but the addition of more boxes makes the spatial properties of direction and distance readily observable (p 173-174)

Geography

Kaufman (2004)

Using Spatial-Temporal Primitives to Improve Geographic Skills for Preservice Teachers

distance

[OED]: 4. a. The extent of space lying between any two objects; the space to be passed over before reaching an object.

Linguistics

OED Online (2nd Ed.)

Oxford English Dictionary, Online Edition

distance

To speak of 'coding distance' does not imply use of a formal system of measurement (however) mental measurement 'by eye' can sometimes be quite exact (p 18)....coding distance with respect to distal external referrents is a very flexible and powerful system, one that is the final arbiter of location for mature organisms in cases where coding systems conflict (p 74). Place learning involves specifying the distance and/or direction of a to-be-located object with respect to landmarks (p 17).

Psychology

Newcombe and Huttenlocher (2000)

Making Space

distance and length

Topic AM3-1. Describe several different measures of distance between two points (e.g., Euclidean, Manhattan, network distance, spherical); Explain how different measures of distance can be used to calculate the spatial weights matrix.

Geography
Education

DiBiase, et al. (2006)

Geographic Information Science and Technology Body of Knowledge

length

[or distance]....The most important aspect of linear features is that they have length. The key equation in the spatial analysis of line data is therefore Pythagoras's theorem for finding the length of the long side of a right-angled triangle (p. 142/ see source for more, much more).

Geography

O'Sullivan and Unwin (2002)

Geographic Information Analysis

length

In many ways, research on linear measurement has not answered fundamental questions that were asked 2 decades ago (p 893). Research suggests that students construct meaningful understanding of length measurement as they abstract and reflect on the process of iterating unit lengths (p 895). In contrast to the Piagetian view, a simpler explanation of the mechanism for length conservation is possible.

Mathematics

Battista (2007)

The Development of Geometric and Spatial Thinking