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 decay"

distance decay

A complex concept that combines numeracy, distance, ratio, and gradient (p. 95)

Geography

Golledge, et al. (2008)

Matching geospatial concepts with geographic educational needs

proximity and distance decay

Topic AM3-5. Describe real world applications where distance decay is an appropriate representation of the strength of spatial relationships (e.g., shopping behavior, property values); Describe real world applications where distance decay would not be an appropriate representation of the strength of spatial relationships (e.g., distance education, commuting, telecommunications); Explain the rationale for using different forms of distance decay functions; Explain how a semi-variogram describes the distance decay in dependence between data values.

Geography
Education

DiBiase, et al. (2006)

Geographic Information Science and Technology Body of Knowledge