Spatial Concept Perspectives

Where is it? (p. 100); Position in space, a cornerstone geographic idea ( p. 271); Relative location: position expressed in terms of one or more known locations (p. 59); absolute location: Position expressed in terms of a coordinate system or mathematical grid (p. 59);...the concept of location is surprisingly difficult to communicate without employing at least one other spatial concept, such as distance, direction, adjacency, or enclosure (p. 100)

Recognize place of objects or features (p. 698)

The concept of location seems simple enough, until you try to describe a location without invoking at least one other spatial concept, such as distance, direction, proximity, enclosure, or topology. At that point, you begin to realize that humans have developed a surprisingly large number of distinct, often subtle, and occasionally complex ways of describing location. This diversity occurs partly because the research verdict is in: the human brain does not have a mechanism for storing and retrieving information about so-called œabsolute locations (p. 181, see source for more).

...to understand human cognitive functioning, we must understand how people code the locations of things and navigate around the world, and how they represent and mentally manipulate spatial information (p 2). A fundamental distinction is that the location of objects can be coded in two basically different but coordinated ways: with respect to external landmarks, or with respect to the self (p 14). A core idea in developing competence...is understanding how to meaningfully enumerate rectangular 3D arrays of squares and cubes, respectively (p 897).