Study: Brains Like North Best Because Maps Do

A new study published in Psychological Science, a journal published by the Association for Psychological Science, recasts how we make geographic sense of our "home town."

In [the study], 26 residents of Tübingen (who had lived in Tübingen for at least two years) were put into a virtual-reality headset and seated in a chair that didn’t allow them to swivel. Participants found themselves in the virtual three-dimensional photorealistic model of their hometown, at locations familiar to them, surrounded by fog masking all but the near distance. Then they had to point to an invisible location—say, the main gate of the university or the fire station. The scenes changed, and so did the participant’s spatial orientation. After 60 three-location trials, participants were asked to draw a map of the town including all the locations they’d pointed to.

The results: Although participants drew differently oriented maps, everyone performed most accurately when facing north and got worse the further they deviated from north. The only explanation the researchers could figure was that they’d all seen, and internalized, a map of Tübingen at some point, and Western maps are all oriented the same way—north on top.

- Medical Xpress

80% of 1100 UK Drivers Prefer Maps Over SatNav

Maps are favoured by 81 per cent of drivers, who believe they can find their way without the help of the dashboard gadgets.

The report, for Kia Motors, found that 34 per cent of the 1,100 UK drivers surveyed admitted losing their way despite using a Satnav.

- Daily Mail

Michigan GIS Data Enhancement Grants and other Government GIS News

To ensure the accuracy of the mapping system used by first central dispatch operators, Ionia County Board of Commissioners approved a Memorandum of Understanding to apply for a sub-grant that will help improve the geographic information system (GIS) maps.

    The grant is the Michigan GIS Sub-Grant and Enhanced 911 Act Grant Program, which assists in making the necessary data improvements to the road centerline GIS layer for the 9-1-1 GIS mappings.

It used to be grants were for GIS software, now they are for data improvement. That's the sign of mature technology and a clearly focus on 911.

- Ionia Sentinel-Standard

It's all the rage to get excited about government agencies spending too much on useless reports. But TBD takes folks to task on the latest one from WMATA, the DC transit authority. The post titled Don't revolt over Metro's $200,000 report just yet, WMATA riders explains what the report says and how in fact it might be worth the cash. Among the things explored: 

"There was a major exercise that involved assembling and analyzing a giant data set of property taxes and property values," [Metro spokesman Dan] Stessel told me. "There were 1.2 million parcels analyzed across all jurisdictions. The parcels then had to be matched to their spatial location in GIS so that we could determine the distance of each parcel to Metrorail. The final step involved running a series of hedonic analyses on the data by the type of property with a number of variables (square footage, class of office space, leased rates, etc.)."

Also noteworthy:

Ethisphere has ranked AECOM, the support services company that helped prepare the report, one of the most ethical companies of 2011, for whatever that's worth. 

Good to know the high priced consultants can do some good. 

- TBD

Sullivan County [TN] needs to “bite the bullet” and hire a full-time GIS, geographical information system, person, the county’s planning director said Wednesday.

The contractor is already heavily used and with redistricting demand for data and maps is very high. Sadly, funding such a position is challenging.

- TriCities.com

Forrester: 5% of Online Users Tap into LBS Monthly

Update: Here's more on the report and a link to it. Never heard from Forrester.

Forrester detailed its findings in a report entitled “Marketing Via Geosocial Apps: Why and How,” and offered suggestions for marketers looking to leverage location-based social networks. Marketers, according to the company, should specially target geosocial app users because they skew younger, are early adopters, and are twice as likely as the average adult to “share information about products they are considering purchasing or have purchased, or a product review.”

- VentureBeat

--- original post 11/6/11 ---

Only about 5% of U.S. online adults said they use location apps at least once a month, according to a new Forrester survey of more than 37,000 respondents. That's only up [from] 4% from last year, even though the overall audience of online adults familiar with these services increased to 30% this year, vs. 16% in 2010.

I added the [from] since I believe this quote was in error. But, I can find no source for the quote or study from Forrester. I've contacted Forrester.

- AdAge

GIS Study of Post Office Closures Offers “Good News/Bad News” for Kansas

The study (which I can't yet find!) by geographer Nigel Waters of George Mason focused only on Kansas and concluded:

"There are 67 locations that are proposed for closure -- exactly half of the 134 proposed closures -- that were identified by the location allocation analysis as sites that should remain open," the study, filed Monday, states.

But it gets worse in terms of the number of closures, if you look at what he sees as possible with further analysis:

He went on to say the GIS software "could provide a better solution that had less of an impact on the population and allowed for more closures than those proposed by the post office. These solutions were better in terms of the service provided to the residents of Kansas."

- Hays Daily News