Kompozycja legendy mapy a sposoby identyfikacji symboli

W artykule omówiono wyniki badania empirycznego, w którym analizowano relacje między legendami o różnej kompozycji a sposobem integracji informacji z mapy i legendy (sposobem rozpoznania znaczenia symboli) w trakcie użytkowania mapy. Badano również zakres treści odczytywanej z legendy oraz zmianę procedur integracji informacji z mapy i legendy wraz z poznawaniem treści mapy.

The legend is critical to proper reading and interpretation thematic map. A legend is a symbol dictionary that explains the signs used in a map, but it also serves several other functions. Furthermore, it is important to understand how information is acquired from a legend and a map. Pickle et al. (1995), when analyzing statistical maps, indicated two strategies that a map user can apply to reading a legend: the map-to-legend strategy (an orientation to the map, then matching the interesting objects to the legend) or the legend-to-map strategy (study the legend, and then locating the read objects on the map). The goal of the reported here analysis is to identify some of the variables that affect legend reading process, namely the strategies of integration information from a legend and a map. The research applies legends of thematic maps with nominal and ordinal information. The information from map and legend is integrated in various ways, e.g. in two above mentioned strategies, and intuitive (relying on the own knowledge or just guessing the meaning of sign). To achieve above mentioned goals the experiment was designed. It aims to simulate the execution of three problem-solving tasks based on the information derived from maps with differently designed legends. Hence the independent variable is the legend design: 'list legend', 'grouping legend' and 'natural legend' with the most clear characteristics of the map language (fig. 6). The think-aloud method was applied: subjects were asked to voice their thoughts during the tasks executions. Based on the coded think-aloud protocols the triangular graphs were developed (fig. 9). The graphs show percentage of recognized symbols using each strategy. Users of natural legend applied legend-to-map strategy the most often, and hardly ever used map-to-legend strategy. There were even some subjects who used intuitive strategy for most recognized signs. The natural legend resulted in the most frequent usage of intuitive strategy among the three tested legend designs. Whereas the map-to-legend was applied the most often by users of list legend. The first task resulted in the use of legend based strategy for most recognized symbols. Solving the second task subjects applied map-to-legend strategy more frequently than in the first task, although many subjects applied each strategy in similar frequency. In the last task most subjects used only legend-to-map strategy. The strategy applied depends on the sequence of task and the kind of legend design used. The learning effect is important, as well as the different requirements of each solved task. Reading the map with unknown content, subjects usually started with studying the legend (legend-to-map strategy). Next question resulted in lower percentage of symbols recognized using this strategy than in the first task, and more often applying intuitive strategy - hence users referred to the information they had perceived in the previous tasks. The results indicated that during the contact with the map of unknown content users most often applied recommended legend-to-map strategy. After reviewing the contents of maps and legends (during the second task), users often resigned using legend, basing on the information perceived during the first task. Furthermore, it was noticed that users perceived only limited scope of information presented on map. The number of identified signs was positively correlated with frequency of legend-to-map strategy appliance.