Rafailaki, E.;
(2006)
The implications of the “palimpsest” of the grids of the main city of Piraeus on creation, transmission and application of cognitive knowledge.
Masters thesis , UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
This research aims to investigate the local rules and constraints which govern the individual behaviours of the pedestrians of Piraeus, Port of Athens, Greece, by examining the relationship between the spatial syntax of mental representations and the spatial syntax of the environment. The overlaid urban grids of the main city create a “palimpsest” on which the mental spatial models of the users are constructed. Invoking three different criteria, three experiments were conducted in the city’s key-locations – Peraiki Coast, Mikrolimano and Sotiros Dios St. The first criterion concerned people’s access to spatial information (target locations that are out of sight vs. locations with visual access). The second and the third criterion concerned the types of the reference systems; egocentric vs. allocentric and global vs. local scale respectively. The configurational, geographical and topological characteristics of the peninsula provide rather an ambiguous sense of the ease or difficulty of the cognitive understanding of the site. Using syntactical tools of space syntax methodology (axial maps, visibility graphs, isovists) and descriptive statistics (mean averages, deviation averages, z-test, central limit theorem test) in the experiments, the close relation between the concepts of intelligibility, spatial configurations and visuospatial representations is demonstrated. The information provided to the pedestrians has an impact on their wayfinding and navigation processes. It is concluded that the cognitive knowledge of the pedestrians of Piraeus (etymological "the place over the passage") is created, transmitted and applied by the geometrical forms of the city, the morphology of the local visual field – which involves issues of configuration and scale of a space layout – and by topological relations. The most ancient grid although it contains the elements that have shaped the city’s contemporary urban space, are not easily recognisable by “strangers”, but they are mostly found in “inhabitants’” internal representations. On the contrary, the elements from the modern times are more frequently cited and they appear to dominate the cognitive model of all users.
| Type: | Thesis (Masters) |
|---|---|
| Title: | The implications of the “palimpsest” of the grids of the main city of Piraeus on creation, transmission and application of cognitive knowledge |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Language: | English |
| Keywords: | spatial cognition, wayfinding, experiments, cognitive maps, mental maps, allocentric, egocentric, spatial syntax, space syntax |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/2361 |
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