The Students' Cognition of Distance and Direction in Hiroshima City

Abstract

This paper examines the properties of cognitive space through employing median instead of mean as a measure of central tendency for the data of cognitive distance and direction. The data used in this study were collected through the questionnaires concerning the cognitive distances and directions, estimated by 212 students of Hiroshirma University, from the front gate of the university to the nine places selected within the city. In that survey, cognitive distances and directions were obtained through the 'statement in words method' and the 'sketch map method', respectively. The results obtained are as follows: 1. The proposition that intra-urban cognitive distance is generally overestimated is not supported when median is employed, while it is supported in case of mean. 2. In Hiroshima city where the built-up area is divided by six river channels, the overestimation of cognitive distance increase with the number of bridges in the route. 3. The cognitive directions deviate 10 or 20 degrees counterclockwise from the true directions, due to the clockwise deviations of river channels running across the city from the north-south line. 4. There are significant relationships between the cognitive distance and subject-centered factors, such as sex, the attitude toward space, duration of residence, although no significant relationships are detected between the cognitive direction and such factors. 5. In the spatial configuration of sampled places constructed from the cognitive distances and directions, the relative locations of places coincide with the objective ones, though variation is appeared between the groupes of respondents classified by similarity of cognition. It is thus clarified that mean is not suitable measure of central tendency for the skewed data concerning cognitive distance and direction. And that, deviations of cognitive directions from the true ones suggest that simplification of spatial information affects the process of spatial cognition.