The effects of symbol iconicity on the integration of spatial knowledge acquired from the fly-through navigation of simulated environments

With the development of the computer and related technologies has come revolutionary changes in how we collect, process, analyze, and view data about the world around us. The potential use of "virtual reality", or computer generated simulated environments, for the display of geographic data raises issues regarding the appropriate representation of spatial data in support of spatial learning and decision making. Understanding the relationship between the methods of presenting spatial data and the acquisition and representation of that data in human spatial knowledge structures is at the core of cognitive studies in cartography and GIS.; This research examined the effects of the level of abstraction of surface feature representation on the perception, and subsequent storage of spatial information obtained in fly-through navigation of natural-terrain, virtual environments. Employing a number of spatial learning and memory tasks, commonly used in spatial knowledge acquisition and wayfinding research, this research evaluated the relationship between the representation of spatial information and subjects' integration of that information. In this research, four levels of abstraction were tested, representing different positions on the continuum of "iconic" to "abstract" representation. The most "iconic" of the representations used in this research employed unclassified aerial photographs "draped" over a digital elevation model. "Moderately iconic" representation employed prototypical texture "drapes" for each thematic land-use class, "cartographic iconic" symbology employed pictoral symbols for each of the land-use classes, and "arbitrary cartographic" symbology employed color to represent land-use classes.; While overall, the findings of this research were not unexpected, it was found that performance of certain tasks (and thus, the spatial knowledge acquired) was, indeed affected by the symbols used to represent the land use of the study area. Additionally, this research has demonstrated how a variety of experimental tasks, more associated with spatial knowledge acquisition and wayfinding research, can be used to evaluate the effects of differences in visual representation on the acquisition and use of spatial knowledge derived from computer generated environments.