Cognitive Surveying: A Framework for Mobile Data Collection, Analysis, and Visualization of Spatial Knowledge and Navigation Practices

摘要

Spatial cognition researchers must, at present, choose between the relevance of the real world and the precision of the lab. Here I introduce cognitive surveying as a framework of computational techniques to enable the automated and precise study of spatial knowledge and navigation practices in everyday environments. I draw on surveying engineering to develop the framework's components: a hardware platform, data structures and algorithms for mobile data collection, and routines for data analysis and visualization. The cognitive surveying system tracks users with GPS, allows them to label meaningful points as landmarks, and asks them to point toward or estimate the distance to out-of-sight landmarks. The data from these and other questions is then used to produce specific analyses and comprehensive overviews of the user's spatial knowledge and navigation practices, which will be of great interest to spatial cognition researchers, the developers of location-based services, urban designers, and city planners alike.