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Maps in People’s Heads: Assessing a New Measure of Context

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 November 2018

Cara Wong ,
Jake Bowers ,
Daniel Rubenson ,
Mark Fredrickson  and
Ashlea Rundlett
Cara Wong*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801, USA
Jake Bowers
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801, USA
Daniel Rubenson
Affiliation:
Department of Politics & Public Administration, Ryerson University, Toronto, ON M5B 2K3, Canada
Mark Fredrickson
Affiliation:
Department of Statistics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
Ashlea Rundlett
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, RI 02881, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: carawong@illinois.edu
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Abstract

To understand the relationship between place and politics, we must measure both political attitudes and the ways in which place is represented in the minds of individuals. In this paper, we assess a new measure of mental representation of geography, in which survey respondents draw their own local communities on maps and describe them. We use a panel study in Canada to present evidence that these maps are both valid and reliable measures of a personally relevant geographic area, laying the measurement groundwork for the growing number of studies using this technology. We hope to set efforts to measure “place” for the study of context and politics on firmer footing. Our validity assessments show that individuals are thinking about people and places with which they have regular contact when asked to draw their communities. Our reliability assessments show that people can draw more or less the same map twice, even when the exercise is repeated months later. Finally, we provide evidence that the concept of community is a tangible consideration in the minds of ordinary citizens and is not simply a normative aspiration or motivation.

Type
Research Notes
Information
Political Science Research and Methods , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , January 2020 , pp. 160 - 168
Copyright
Copyright © The European Political Science Association 2018 

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Supplementary material: Link

Wong et al. Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/9XWGHN
Link