Towards a Cognitive Geographical Analysis

Keywords: cognitive geography, spatial cognition, geographical analysis, navigation
Abstract Type: Paper Abstract

Abstract

The emergence of richer, larger data on human mobility, and rapid advances in computational models of spatial cognition and learning provide potential avenues for deepening our quantitative understanding of the relationship between people and space. Behavioural and cognitive geographic research forms a foundation for much of this work, yet the most significant recent developments are found elsewhere, in fields including artificial intelligence, computational neuroscience, social physics, transportation, and computer science. The opportunities for expanding the scope and ambition of cognitive and behavioural geography are real.

This talk will consider how behavioural and cognitive geographers can contribute to, collaborate within, and benefit from these emerging subfields, building on recent case studies. It will explore how cognitive conceptions of distance and position can be constructed through novel modelling and data collection methods, and eventually integrated into a new suite for geographical analytical methods. The talk will also address the bases of spatial decisions, and the formalisation of decision models based on cognitive representations of space. We will also consider issues of uncertainty, heterogeneity, and bias, inherent to these data and models. Finally, the talk will consider the role of the geographer in the context of balancing and integrating computational and data-driven approaches with established theory and conceptual understanding.