Spatial Thinking and Reasoning

空间思维和推理是大多数知识领域的共性。它是地理学和其他地球科学的核心，在从天文学到动物学的各个领域都很重要，因为在这些领域，地理空间数据库是常见的。其他知识领域，如舞蹈、音乐、绘画、雕塑、遗传学、生物学、物理学和语言学，都需要空间思维和使用空间隐喻。空间思维和推理对解决某些类型问题的独特贡献已经得到了像贝克和乌塔尔这样的心理学家的认可，他们声称，准备和使用信息的空间表征(如在地图、图表和图像中)提供了一个任何其他方法都无法比拟的视角。本研究项目的目的是开发空间任务本体和概念词典，以辅助空间思维和推理的发展。研究人员将定义空间思维，并确定有助于人们理解空间思维和推理在日常生活中的性质和重要性的任务集。任务本体论将识别不同级别和类型的任务，包括为识别空间基元而设计的任务，并将说明如何将这些基元扩展到离散级别。这些层次的范围从简单的派生到更复杂的基元和派生的多重组合，以形成复杂的概念，如地理关联和空间内插。当详细阐述时，这些概念有助于理解日常活动，例如学习上小学的路线，选择居住的社区，或选择工作、购物或享受娱乐活动的地方。该项目旨在综合关于空间本体论的理论工作和关于日常经验世界中的空间任务绩效的经验工作。为了实现该项目的目标，将在实验室和现场环境中开发和测试一系列创新任务，以评估对日常生活中嵌入的空间概念的理解是否有助于丰富对社区、城市、地区、国家和世界的地理理解。该项目将探索人们在面对空间信息时如何组织他们对空间的思考方式，以及他们使用的思维和推理形式。这项研究应该阐明加强对地理概念的理解如何影响空间信息的综合，并将说明正规的地理概念培训所产生的差异。所有这些发展都有智力方面的影响，从地理知识的正规化到开发更有效的地理信息系统。该项目将影响今后加强地理信息系统的发展，并有助于确定在各级开展更有效的地理教育的新战略。

Spatial thinking and reasoning is common to most knowledge domains. It is central to geography and other geosciences, and it is important in domains ranging from astronomy to zoology where geospatial databases are common. Other knowledge areas, such as dance, music, painting, sculpture, genetics, biology, physics, and linguistics, all require spatial thinking and use spatial metaphors. The peculiar contribution of spatial thinking and reasoning to solve certain types of problems has been recognized by psychologists like Beck and Uttal, who claimed that preparing and using spatial representations of information (as in maps, graphs, and images) provides a perspective that is not matched by any other means. The purpose of this research project is to develop a spatial task ontology and a concept lexicon to assist in the development of spatial thinking and reasoning. The investigator will define spatial thinking and identify sets of tasks that will help people understand the nature and importance of spatial thinking and reasoning in everyday life. The task ontology will identify different levels and types of tasks ranging from those designed to identify spatial primitives and will illustrate how such primitives can be expanded into discrete levels. The levels range from simple derivations to more complex multiple combinations of primitives and derivations to form complex concepts, such as geographic association and spatial interpolation. When elaborated, these concepts assist in the understanding of everyday activities, such as learning a route to primary school, choosing a neighborhood in which to live, or selecting places to work, shop, or enjoy recreational activities. This project aims to synthesize theoretical work on spatial ontology with empirical work on spatial task performance in the world of everyday experience. To achieve the project's objectives, sets of innovative tasks will be developed and tested in both laboratory and field settings to evaluate whether or not developing an understanding of spatial concepts embedded in everyday living leads to enriched geographic understanding of neighborhood, city, region, nation, and the world.This project will explore the ways that people organize the ways they think about space and the forms of thinking and reasoning that they use when they are confronted with spatial information. The research should shed light on how enhanced understanding of geographic concepts influences the comprehensive of spatial information, and it will illustrate differences that result from formal training in geographic concepts. All of these developments have intellectual implications ranging from the formalization of geographic knowledge to the development of more effective geographic information systems. This project will influence the development of future enhancements of geographic information systems, and it could help identify new strategies for more effective geographic education at all levels.