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 "object"

discrete entities

Topic CF4-1. Discuss the human predilection to conceptualize geographic phenomena in terms of discrete entities; Describe particular entities in terms of space, time, and properties; Describe the perceptual processes (e.g., edge detection) that aid cognitive objectification Compare and contrast differing epistemological and metaphysical viewpoints on the 'reality' of geographic entities; Identify the types of features that need to be modeled in a particular GIS application or procedure; Identify phenomena that are difficult or impossible to conceptualize in terms of entities; Describe the difficulties inherent in extending the 'tabletop' metaphor of objects to the geographic environment; Evaluate the effectiveness of GIS data models for representing the identity, existence, and lifespan of entities; Justify or refute the conception of fields (e.g., temperature, density) as spatially-intensive attributes of (sometimes amorphous and anonymous) entities; Model 'gray area' phenomena, such as categorical coverages (a.k.a. discrete fields), in terms of objects; Evaluate the influence of scale on the conceptualization of entities.

Geography
Education

DiBiase, et al. (2006)

Geographic Information Science and Technology Body of Knowledge

element

External representations consist of elements and the spatial relations among them. Typically, elements in a diagram or other external representation are used to represent elements in the world (p 16)....elements schematize certain physical or semantic properties, omitting others (p 17). For these schematic elements, their meanings share senses that appear to be related to the mathematical or Gestalt properties of the elements (p 17).

Psychology

Tversky (2005)

Functional Significance of Visuospatial Representations

identity

Identify objects by type or category (p. 91, b 698);

Geography

Golledge, et al. (2008)

Matching geospatial concepts with geographic educational needs

object

The things that occupy the geographic world, described and measured in various ways as points, lines, areas, or volumes. "In practice, points, lines, and areas are most often represented in the following standard forms: 1) Points as pairs of coordinates, in latitude/longitude or some other standard system 2) Lines as ordered sequences of points connected by straight lines 3) Areas as ordered rings of points, also connected by straight lines to form polygons.

Geography

de Smith, et al. (2008)

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

object

The handling of objects leads in practice to the analysis of figures, or of shapes. There is...a simultaneous construction both of euclidean figures (as a result of the object being ascribed a constant size), which remains the same during changes of position) and projective figures (as a result of coordinating different views of the object, i.e. perspective) p 10). [objects result from] perceptual constancy of shape and size (p 10)

Psychology

Piaget and Inhelder (1967)

The Child's Conception of Space

object

The mental spatial models are mental representations that preserve information about objects and the spatial relations among them and are updated as new information comes in (p 6). Through our bodies, we perceive and act on the world around us and learn about the consequences of our actions. One way that we view and think about bodies is as objects. Common objects can be referred to at several levels of abstraction (p 5). Bodies are a privileged object for humans. Unlike other objects, they are experienced from inside as well as outside (p 4).

Psychology

Tversky (2005)

Functional Significance of Visuospatial Representations

object classification

Having described a natural object using...professionally arrived-at vocabulary and techniques...the geoscientist then classifies the object into a group or category. Paleontologists or icropaleontologists classify fossils or microfossils according to their morphology; geomorphologists do the same with landforms. Traditionally, mineralogists or petrologists (scientists who study rocks) identify minerals in a hand sample or photomicrograph by shape, color (including color changes under different lighting conditions), and texture (e.g., Does it have stripes?

Earth Science

Kastens and Ishikawa (2006)

Spatial thinking in the geosciences and cognitive sciences: A cross-disciplinary look at the intersection of two fields

object description

Given a collection of objectsthat intuitively seem related in some way, what should one observe, and what should one measure, in order to capture the shape of each object in a way that is rigorous, unambiguous, and includes all of the important observable parameters?...The mental processes of pioneering observers of nature as they develop a new description methodology include (1) careful observation of the shape of a large number of objects; (2) integrating these observations into a mental model of what constitutes the shared characteristics among this group of objects; (3) identifying ways in

Earth Science

Kastens and Ishikawa (2006)

Spatial thinking in the geosciences and cognitive sciences: A cross-disciplinary look at the intersection of two fields

object location recall

[The] memory for the location of a discrete object [is important], but geologists must also have a memory for recurring patterns or configurations, for example, a distinctive sequence of rock types. (p. 63/see source for more)

Earth Science

Kastens and Ishikawa (2006)

Spatial thinking in the geosciences and cognitive sciences: A cross-disciplinary look at the intersection of two fields

object view

In the object view, we consider the world as a series of entities located in space. Entities are (usually) real: You can touch them, stand in them, perhaps even move them around.... Objects may be classified into different object types: for example into point objects, line objects, and area objects (p. 5/see source for more).

Geography

O'Sullivan and Unwin (2002)

Geographic Information Analysis