Training Workshop in Spatial Filter Modeling for Environmental and Social Scientists and Applied Statisticians

研讨会向一群从事空间分析、人口学、流行病学、生态学或计量经济学的学者和知名专业人员介绍空间过滤的新方法。非参数空间过滤和半参数空间过滤属于一个发展中的技术家族，其目的是在探索性和验证性框架中分析地理参考数据。通过夏季讲习班传播这一较新的方法很重要，原因有几个：[1]空间过滤概念的简单性使空间统计更容易为一个非常广泛的用户群体所接受，他们熟悉传统统计学，但不一定熟悉空间统计学；[2)空间过滤方法越来越多地出现在方法学文献和应用文献中，从广泛的学科范围来看，空间过滤方法越来越受欢迎，需要培训更多的研究人员使用它；[3)空间过滤大大简化了空间自相关数据的线性、非线性、广义线性以及混合模型的实施；[4]为了评价和批评空间过滤方法，研讨会将把它们与已建立的空间数据分析模式并列；最后，将向研讨会参与者介绍在广泛可用的R计算平台中制作空间过滤算法原型的软件工具。讲习班的目的是使学员能够在各种提供的或个人拥有的地理参考数据集上练习他们所获得的技能。根据学员的具体背景，学员将在讲习班期间接受培训，使其成为新出现的空间过滤方法的精通用户、知情讲师或潜在的开发人员。随着地理参考数据的数量迅速增加，地理信息系统的构成几乎支持我们日常生活的方方面面，以知情的方式分析地理参考数据的技能变得越来越重要。本研讨会有助于为学术和专业专家提供这些分析技能。潜在参与者将遵循正式申请程序，以便获得2008年为期一周的夏季讲习班有限的25个席位之一。遴选委员会将确保选定的参与者群体的多元化和资格，以使不同的学者混合参加讲习班。

The workshop introduces a group of emanating academics and established professionals, who are engaged in spatial analysis, demography, epidemiology, ecology or econometrics, to the novel methodology of spatial filtering. Non-parametric spatial filtering and semi-parametric spatial filtering belong to a developing family of techniques that is geared toward analyzing geo-referenced data in an exploratory and confirmatory framework. The dissemination of this newer methodology via the summer workshop is important for several reasons: [1] the conceptional simplicity of spatial filtering makes spatial statistics more accessible to a very wide user group, one that is familiar with conventional statistics but not necessarily with spatial statistics; [2] the increasing appearance of spatial filtering approaches in methodological and applied literatures from a broad disciplinary scope indexes both its growing popularity and a need for more researchers to be trained in its uses; [3] spatial filtering dramatically simplifies the implementation of linear, nonlinear, generalized linear as well as mixed models for spatially autocorrelated data; [4] in order to evaluate and critique the spatial filtering approaches, the workshop will juxtapose them with established modes of analyzing spatial data; and, finally, [5] the workshop participants will be introduced to software tools that prototype spatial filtering algorithms within the widely available R computing-platform. The workshop is designed to allow participants to practice their acquired skills on a wide range of provided or personally owned geo-referenced datasets. Depending on their specific backgrounds, the participants will be trained during the workshop to become well-versed users, informed instructors, or potential developers of the emerging spatial filtering methodology. With the rapidly increasing volume of geo-referenced data and the constitution of geographic information systems to support virtually every facet of our daily lives, skills to analyze geo-referenced data in an informed manner are becoming increasingly relevant. This workshop contributes toward providing academic and professional specialist these analytical skills. Potential participants will follow a formal application procedure in order to obtain one of the limited 25 seats of this one-week summer workshop in 2008. A selection committee will ensure the pluralism and qualifications of the selected group of participants in such a way that a diverse mix of scholars will attend the workshop.