The task of navigating and orienting oneself in an unknown environment might seem arbitrary to most people. For a person with a visual impairment however, it can prove to be a challenge. Much research has been conducted to provide useful software solutions to aid this problem. Nevertheless, not enough research has been put into studying the use of our everyday sounds for such software. The present thesis is aimed at evaluating the usefulness of utilising diegetic spatial audio. After a real environment was replicated in a virtual audio environment without visual input, 16 sound students from the University of Skövde were asked to perform the same set of tasks in the virtual and the real environment. The results indicated that diegetic spatial audio is an important part of navigating without vision and that the experiment would be interesting to perform on a larger scale with visually impaired participants.

No description available.

A nossa pesquisa se insere no contexto da educação dos jovens e adultos assentados. Em que se objetivou analisar o impacto da escolarização destes jovens e adultos assentados de reforma agrária, o qual foi promovido pelo Educampo I Projeto integrado ao Programa Nacional de Educação na Reforma Agrária (PRONERA). Analisando de que forma estes jovens e adultos demonstraram o conhecimentos geográficos como saber popular e se a escolarização desenvolveu a percepção do território como lugar de vida. Apartir da metodologia da Educação de Jovens e Adultos (EJA) para o 1º Segmento do ensino fundamental. Para tanto, realizou-se uma pesquisa documental no âmbito educacional escolar. Foram pesquisadas seis turmas de seis comunidades do Projeto de Assentamento (PA) Vila Amazônia no município de Parintins-Amazonas-AM, no período de 2007 a 2010. Constataram-se, como resultados desta pesquisa, que o processo de escolarização; a formação continuada, inspirada nas idéias de Paulo Freire, propondo uma educação que considera os sujeitos e a sua realidade; o uso da coleção Viver, Aprender, como material didático nortearam a prática da sala de aula, proporcionado aos educandos aprendizagens que demonstraram por meio de atividades como mapas, maquetes, desenhos, linguagens interpretativas do lugar, os conhecimentos geográficos com base no censo comum, além da biografia dos educandos onde os relatos mostram as trajetórias de vida, a importância de continuar estudando e como percebem o território como espaço e lugar de vida. E, por fim, destacar a mudança de postura dos educadores e educandos, que a partir da escolarização elevaram a autoestima, e são reconhecidos como lideranças na comunidade / Our research is in the context of educating youth and adults seated. What is aimed at analyzing the impact of schooling of these young people and adults settled agrarian reform, which was sponsored by Project Educampo I integrated the National Program for Agrarian Reform Education (PRONE). Analyzing how these young people and adults have shown geographic knowledge as popular knowledge and schooling developed the perception of the area as a place of life.Based on the methodology of Youth and Adults (EJA) for the 1st segment of the school. To this end, there was a desk in school education. We surveyed six groups of six communities in the Settlement Project (AP) Amazon Village in the city of Parintins, Amazonas-AM, in the period 2007 to 2010. It was found, as results from this research that the process of schooling, continuing education, inspired by the ideas of Paulo Freire, proposing an education that considers the subject and reality, the use of the collection Living, Learning, teaching materials and guided practice the classroom, giving students who have demonstrated learning through activities such as maps, models, drawings, interpretive languages of the place, the geographical knowledge based on common census, besides the biographies of the students where the reports show the paths of life, the importance to continue studying and how they perceive the space and territory as a place of life. Finally, highlight the changing attitude of educators and students from the school that raised selfesteem, are recognized as leaders in the community.

The concept of proximity is an important aspect of human reasoning. Despite the diversity of applications that require proximity measures, the most intuitive notion is that of spatial nearness. The aim of this thesis is to investigate the underpinnings of the notion of nearness, propose suitable formalisations and apply them to the processing of GIS data. More particularly, this work offers a framework for spatial proximity that supports the development of more intuitive tools for users of geographic data processing applications. Many of the existing spatial reasoning formalisms do not account for proximity at all while others stipulate it by using natural language expressions as symbolic values. Some approaches suggest the association of spatial relations with fuzzy membership grades to be calculated for locations in a map using Euclidean distance. However, distance is not the only factor that influences nearness perception. Hence, previous work suggests that nearness should be defined from a more basic notion of influence area. I argue that this approach is flawed, and that nearness should rather be defined from a new, richer notion of impact area that takes both the nature of an object and the surrounding environment into account. A suitable notion of nearness considers the impact areas of both objects whose degree of nearness is assessed. This is opposed to the common approach of only taking one of both objects, seen as a reference to assess the nearness of the other to it, into consideration. Cognitive findings are incorporated to make the framework more relevant to the users of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) with respect to their own spatial cognition. GIS users bring a wealth of knowledge about physical space, particularly geographic space, into the processing of GIS data. This is taken into account by introducing the notion of context. Context represents either an expert in the context field or information from the context field as collated by an expert. In order to evaluate and to show the practical implications of the framework, experiments are conducted on a GIS dataset incorporating expert knowledge from the Touristic Road Travel domain.

The concept of proximity is an important aspect of human reasoning. Despite the diversity of applications that require proximity measures, the most intuitive notion is that of spatial nearness. The aim of this thesis is to investigate the underpinnings of the notion of nearness, propose suitable formalisations and apply them to the processing of GIS data. More particularly, this work offers a framework for spatial proximity that supports the development of more intuitive tools for users of geographic data processing applications. Many of the existing spatial reasoning formalisms do not account for proximity at all while others stipulate it by using natural language expressions as symbolic values. Some approaches suggest the association of spatial relations with fuzzy membership grades to be calculated for locations in a map using Euclidean distance. However, distance is not the only factor that influences nearness perception. Hence, previous work suggests that nearness should be defined from a more basic notion of influence area. I argue that this approach is flawed, and that nearness should rather be defined from a new, richer notion of impact area that takes both the nature of an object and the surrounding environment into account. A suitable notion of nearness considers the impact areas of both objects whose degree of nearness is assessed. This is opposed to the common approach of only taking one of both objects, seen as a reference to assess the nearness of the other to it, into consideration. Cognitive findings are incorporated to make the framework more relevant to the users of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) with respect to their own spatial cognition. GIS users bring a wealth of knowledge about physical space, particularly geographic space, into the processing of GIS data. This is taken into account by introducing the notion of context. Context represents either an expert in the context field or information from the context field as collated by an expert. In order to evaluate and to show the practical implications of the framework, experiments are conducted on a GIS dataset incorporating expert knowledge from the Touristic Road Travel domain.

A nossa pesquisa se insere no contexto da educação dos jovens e adultos assentados. Em que se objetivou analisar o impacto da escolarização destes jovens e adultos assentados de reforma agrária, o qual foi promovido pelo Educampo I Projeto integrado ao Programa Nacional de Educação na Reforma Agrária (PRONERA). Analisando de que forma estes jovens e adultos demonstraram o conhecimentos geográficos como saber popular e se a escolarização desenvolveu a percepção do território como lugar de vida. Apartir da metodologia da Educação de Jovens e Adultos (EJA) para o 1º Segmento do ensino fundamental. Para tanto, realizou-se uma pesquisa documental no âmbito educacional escolar. Foram pesquisadas seis turmas de seis comunidades do Projeto de Assentamento (PA) Vila Amazônia no município de Parintins-Amazonas-AM, no período de 2007 a 2010. Constataram-se, como resultados desta pesquisa, que o processo de escolarização; a formação continuada, inspirada nas idéias de Paulo Freire, propondo uma educação que considera os sujeitos e a sua realidade; o uso da coleção Viver, Aprender, como material didático nortearam a prática da sala de aula, proporcionado aos educandos aprendizagens que demonstraram por meio de atividades como mapas, maquetes, desenhos, linguagens interpretativas do lugar, os conhecimentos geográficos com base no censo comum, além da biografia dos educandos onde os relatos mostram as trajetórias de vida, a importância de continuar estudando e como percebem o território como espaço e lugar de vida. E, por fim, destacar a mudança de postura dos educadores e educandos, que a partir da escolarização elevaram a autoestima, e são reconhecidos como lideranças na comunidade / Our research is in the context of educating youth and adults seated. What is aimed at analyzing the impact of schooling of these young people and adults settled agrarian reform, which was sponsored by Project Educampo I integrated the National Program for Agrarian Reform Education (PRONE). Analyzing how these young people and adults have shown geographic knowledge as popular knowledge and schooling developed the perception of the area as a place of life.Based on the methodology of Youth and Adults (EJA) for the 1st segment of the school. To this end, there was a desk in school education. We surveyed six groups of six communities in the Settlement Project (AP) Amazon Village in the city of Parintins, Amazonas-AM, in the period 2007 to 2010. It was found, as results from this research that the process of schooling, continuing education, inspired by the ideas of Paulo Freire, proposing an education that considers the subject and reality, the use of the collection Living, Learning, teaching materials and guided practice the classroom, giving students who have demonstrated learning through activities such as maps, models, drawings, interpretive languages of the place, the geographical knowledge based on common census, besides the biographies of the students where the reports show the paths of life, the importance to continue studying and how they perceive the space and territory as a place of life. Finally, highlight the changing attitude of educators and students from the school that raised selfesteem, are recognized as leaders in the community.

No description available.

The popularity of spatial databases increases since the amount of the spatial data that need to be handled has increased by the use of digital maps, images from satellites, video cameras, medical equipment, sensor networks, etc. Spatial data are difficult to examine and extract interesting knowledge / hence, applications that assist decision-making about spatial data like weather forecasting, traffic supervision, mobile communication, etc. have been introduced. In this thesis, more natural and precise knowledge from spatial data is generated by construction of fuzzy spatial data cube and extraction of fuzzy association rules from it in order to improve decision-making about spatial data. This involves an extensive research about spatial knowledge discovery and how fuzzy logic can be used to develop it. It is stated that incorporating fuzzy logic to spatial data cube construction necessitates a new method for aggregation of fuzzy spatial data. We illustrate how this method also enhances the meaning of fuzzy spatial generalization rules and fuzzy association rules with a case-study about weather pattern searching. This study contributes to spatial knowledge discovery by generating more understandable and interesting knowledge from spatial data by extending spatial generalization with fuzzy memberships, extending the spatial aggregation in spatial data cube construction by utilizing weighted measures, and generating fuzzy association rules from the constructed fuzzy spatial data cube.

Diese Dissertation befasst sich mit räumlichen Wahrnehmungen und Diskursen, mit denen man den Raum und seine Bestandteile behandelte. Die Eroberung Sibiriens im 17. Jahrhundert bewirkte einen tiefgreifenden Wandel in den russischen Vorstellungen über die weit entfernte Peripherie sowie deren Ressourcen. Die neuen Denkweisen kristallisierten sich in einer diskursiven Formation heraus, die Macht über Raum und Rohstoffe Sibiriens symbolisierte und organisierte. Dieser „Berg-Diskurs“ trug moderne Züge, denn er bedurfte sich neuer Formen der Kontrolle über die Raumsproduktion. Diese Einstellung wurde allmählich zu einer erstaunlich überlebensfähigen räumlichen Ideologie und zum festen Bestandteil des russischen Bodenschätzediskurses der Zukunft. Die Rolle der Wissensproduzenten wechselte zwischen den zentralen und regionalen Institutionen und Netzwerken. Der „Altai“, der den kaiserlichen Bergbau-Bezirk und die Gebirgslandschaft umfasste, wurde auf Grund seines Rohstoffreichtums von Repräsentanten des russischen Staates als Region erfunden. Die Dissertation stellt die imaginären und realen Geographien des Altai in drei unterschiedlichen Dimensionen dar. Dabei geht es um den Wandel der Repräsentationen von geographischen Räumen und der Berglandschaften in Russland insgesamt (Makroebene), die Mehrschichtigkeit des russischen Diskurses über Bergregionen und Gebirgslandschaften (Mesoebene) und den Altai als facettenreiches Konzept einer komplexen imperialen geographischen Imagination (Mikroebene). Die Beschreibung des Altai faßte in sich zahlreiche inkohärente Bilder verschiedener sozialer Gruppen. Der Ort wurde durch mentale Geographien erfolgreich instrumentalisiert, z.B. „die Goldenen Gebirge“ und „die sibirische Schweiz“. Diese Bilder machten die Region sichtbar, sowohl für nationalistisch gesinnte Gruppen als auch die breiteren Bervölkerungsschichten. / This dissertation focuses on the production of imperial space with a particular emphasis on the role of power discourses concerning mineral resources. By relying on published materials, it aims to establish a new conceptual framework for the examining of cultural patterns and practices of imagining of space and mineral wealth. For that purpose, it introduces a concept of the ”Berg-Discourse” that expands our understanding of the Russian engagement with geographical space. It begins by exploring Russian exposure to the mountains and mineral resources of Siberia in terms of the spatial knowledge production. It then examines how Russian imperial strategies and aspirations were embedded in the making of the Altai, a vast mining territory in West Siberia that once formed a private domain of the Russian rulers. The dissertation argues that the making of the Altai was in many ways part of the same imperial impulse towards mineral exploitation. It explores the ways in which the Altai was imagined through its enormous mineral endowment; how the imagined place became real; and how this real place became imagined from various vantage points. As the study shows, the region acquired multiple mental representations, enjoying a near mythological presence across imperial culture. Finally, the dissertation concludes by showing how this landscape was incorporated into imperial and national myths in the course of production and consumption of spatial knowledge about the remote location.

A desktop virtual reality environment of a campus area (called Silcton) was used to examine how instructing participants on performing exploration in an unfamiliar environment impacts the acquired spatial knowledge. Participants explored the Silcton virtual environment, after having received differing instructions on what to do. Two instruction conditions were tested: (i) the participant was provided with instructions to freely explore the Silcton virtual environment for at least 10 minutes (ii) the individual explored the environment while being instructed to pay specific attention to the environment’s layout. By providing different types of instructions before exploring an unfamiliar environment, we can learn more about how the instructions' wording impacts the acquired spatial knowledge, especially when aiming for a particular behavior or memory effects. We also tested for participants’ spatial abilities and observed differences between genders and based on individual differences. The present study shows no statistically significant differences in pointing and model-building scores between any of the tested groups, namely, the different instruction groups, gender, and groups with 'low' and 'high' spatial abilities. Time spent in the environment and pointing error showed a significant negative correlation, which indicates that as experience with the environment increases, participants become better at pointing to targets in the environment. The lack of significant results might be attributed to the overall small sample sizes and/or the distribution of men and women in the two instruction groups. Therefore, for future research a close monitoring of the experimental process and a larger retainment of participants are required to provide solid evidence and draw any general conclusion. / En stationär virtuell verklighetsmiljö på ett campusområde, kallad Silcton, användes för att undersöka hur instruktioner för deltagare relaterat till att utforska okänd miljö påverkar den förvärvade rumsliga kunskapen. Deltagarna utforskade Silctons virtuella miljö, efter att ha fått olika instruktioner om vad de ska göra. Två instruktionsförhållanden testades: (i) deltagaren fick instruktionen att fritt utforska Silctons virtuella miljö i minst 10 minuter (ii) deltagaren fick instruktionen att utforska miljön samtidigt som han skulle ägna särskild uppmärksamhet åt miljöns design. Genom att tillhandahålla olika typer av instruktioner innan vi utforskar en okänd miljö kan vi lära oss mer om hur instruktionernas formulering påverkar den förvärvade rumsliga kunskapen, särskilt när man siktar på ett visst beteende eller visa minneseffekter. Vi testade också för deltagarnas rumsliga förmågor och observerade skillnader mellan könen och individuella skillnader. Resultatet för studien visar inga statistiskt signifikanta skillnader i pek- och modellbyggande poäng mellan någon av de testade grupperna, nämligen de olika instruktionsgrupperna, kön och grupper med "låga" och "höga" rumsliga förmågor. Tid i miljön och pekfel visade en signifikant negativ korrelation, vilket indikerar att när erfarenheten med miljön ökar blir deltagarna bättre på att peka på mål i miljön. Bristen på signifikanta resultat kan hänföras till de övergripande små urvalsstorlekarna och/eller fördelningen av män och kvinnor i de två instruktionsgrupperna. Därför krävs för framtida forskning en noggrann övervakning av den experimentella processen och ett större antal deltagare för att tillhandahålla solida bevis och dra några allmänna slutsatser.