Board 1972 Cartographic Communication

CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
ChristopherBoard
GEOGRAPHY, MAP USE A N D CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
In a volume entitled Maps in Modern Geography it may seem strange to some that
cartographic communication be given a separate chapter. Are not all maps ex-
pected to communicate geographical information in one way or another? If so, the
term cartographic con~municationwould appear to be somewhat tautologous.
One might reply that cartographic communication is only one form of com-
munication and that it emphasises not only the medium but both the initiator and
receiver of the information being communicated. It emphasizes a process rather
than a product and it certainly says more than cartography tout court does or than
most of the current definitions of the field do.
It used to be accepted that whatever else it was and, however one defined it,
geography was about maps. For long, Hartshorne's assertion that geography was
"represented in the world of knowledge by its techniques of map use" and that it
depended "first and fundamentally on the comparison of maps" went
unchallenged.' However, Bunge's influential Theoretical Geography argued that
despite the advantages of maps as spatial tools "mathematics is the broader and
more flexible medium for geography". This in the middle of the so-called quan-
titative revolution may have been just what the "new geographers" were looking
for.* TO some extent the writings of geographerlcartographers such as J.K.
Wright and Arthur H. Robinson3 had unwittingly helped to undermine the
geographer's confidence in his classical technique by stressing the subjective
qualities of maps. It was assumed, in line with Wooldridge and East, that the map
was "pre-eminently the geographer's tool both in investigation of his problems
and the presentation of his result^".^ Furthermore, it was generally accepted that
"no one claiming the title of geographer, however humbly, is entitled to be
ignorant of how maps are made".5 Even when Maps and Diagram was first
published, apart from a reference in the preface to the map being the traditional
medium of the geographer,6 it was clearly assumed that all geographers were
required to include map work in their training and the thematic arrangement of
the book was therefore aimed principally at the topics with which geographers .
would be concerned. By the 1960s this notion was being challenged by the shock
CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION 43
troops of the quantitative revolution, or, as Duncan and others put it, "those who
are interested in 'statistical geography' and who are dissatisfied with the level of
rigor of inferences based solely on maps — the mainstay of the 'classical'
geographer". 7 Nevertheless, although Berry explains that four maps do about the
same job as forty-three for portraying the basic similarities in the development of
countries world-wide by means of factor analysis, the resulting patterns were
nevertheless displayed by maps.8 With the spread of new syllabuses first in higher
education then at the school level, pressure for teaching quantitative methods has
inevitably reduced the time available for map work of all kinds. Such trends are
not confined to Anglo-America and the British Commonwealth, they are also
noticeable in France, where Claval and Wieber regret the tendency to decry
cartographic analysis and thematic map making in favour of statistical or mathe-
matical methods in geography. 9
Despite these developments expert commentators still acknowledge the im-
portance of map skills in geography. 1 0 And in its evidence to the Ordnance Survey
Review Committee, the Geographical Association went further, noting that future
generations of citizens learn about maps principally in geography lessons at
school. 11 Great interest is still expressed in the notion of graphicacy which involves
"the communication of spatial information that cannot be conveyed adequately by
verbal or numerical means". 12 While much of Balchin's paper described empirical
studies by educationalists with varying backgrounds, the essays by Robinson and
Petchenik 13 went back to more fundamental notions on the conception of space as
discussed by Piaget and Polanyi amongst others. There is furthermore some
emphasis in Balchin's work on drawing skills (which are not necessarily correlated
with spatial ability) and graphic communication. Robinson and Petchenik scarcely
refer to the writings of geographers concerned with map reading and map
interpretation. One possible explanation is that, as with Robinson's review of
1952, 14 the principal focus is upon the thematic map, upon which little had been
written. Few if any textbooks on map work discuss the problems of reading
thematic maps except for those depicting geology, weather and land use. Most
effort has always been directed to the admittedly considerable problems of read-
ing topographic maps, whereas somehow it has usually been assumed that if the
student had had some experience of making a small-scale thematic map from
statistical data he could also read it. T o an extent such a notion is supported by
Morrison's application to maps of Nelms's remark that, "you can read drawings
that you cannot make, but you cannot make a drawing unless you could read it if it
were made by someone else. For this reason, learning to make drawings begins by
learning to read them". 15 Most student exercises yield maps too small to provide a
thematic map large enough to provide a challenge to any map reader. Generally
not until such a map is being compiled as a tool in a programme of research is the
map reader offered an opportunity to visualize patterns and correlations which
may stimulate further hypotheses.
44 CHRISTOPHER BOARD
Another possible explanation for the recent concentration on simple the-

matic maps may be that mentioned by Petchenik. 16 She argued that the thematic
meaning is derived essentially from the form of notation rather than any percep-
tual experience with the phenomenon being mapped. Research in this field was
urgently needed, but was also easier to execute because, on the whole, thematic
maps were simpler and could be tackled by stimulus-response approaches derived
from behavioural psychology. By contrast, not only were topographic maps much
more complex, but, by and large, their geographical meaning was obtainable from
perceptual experience of the landscape itself whether directly or vicariously.
Geographers had, at least from the time of W.M. Davis, employed topographic
maps to convey a sense of realism in courses on physical (and later human)
geography. For a university course on physical geography "maps are simply
indispensable. ... At first their meaning grows plainer and plainer, until at the
close of the course they are as suggestive as they were incommunicative at the
beginning". 17 In her classic book on geographical map interpretation Alice Gar-
nett expressed the nature of the relationship between reality and the map in the
geographer's mind thus: "... to gain even a slight perception of what the map truly
portrays the mind must be enriched by contact with, for example, true mountain,
plain, or fenland, with rural life and scattered farmstead opposed to the unending
maze of streets within large industrial centres. Without this our mental equipment
possesses no standard or scale of associations or of space relations whereon to base
impressions of other regions seen only through map reading". 1 8
Textbooks and manuals on the geographical interpretation of landscape now
abound and the theme is taken up elsewhere in this volume by Muehrcke.
Considering their long experience in using maps, particularly topographical ones,
it is perhaps rather strange that more geographers have not contributed to the
discussion of cartographic communication. Such concerns have been left to the
cartographers to take up and, as we have seen, the latter have largely ignored
topographic maps. Future discussion of cartographic communication should
draw upon the wealth of experience and material in the geographical profession
particularly among those who teach map work skills.
C A R T O G R A P H Y AS A S C I E N C E OF COMMUNICATION
One of the first to explore the idea of cartography as a science of communication

was Robinson who makes his position abundantly clear in the second edition of
Elements of Cartography.19 He saw the primary process of cartography as "the
conceptual planning and design of the map as a medium for communication or
research". It is also clear that he was thinking primarily of thematic maps as media
for communication. In his Look of Maps, cartography was regarded as a visual
technique 2 0 and in the same book he introduced analogies between thematic
cartography and architecture, although the latter concept was regretably never
pursued. It is instructive to note in the history of the use of posters for advertising
Barnicoat quotes Cassandre, a poster designer of the 1920s. 21 For him, painting
was an end in itself, "the poster is only a means to an end, a means of communica
tion between the dealer and the public, something like a telegraph". Cassandre in
that statement was preparing the way for the emergence of the professional
communications expert. Now the relationship between the dealer, the medium
and the clientele has always been much closer than it has been generally in the
realm of map design. Sales of products or services furnished by cartographic
establishments in competition with another could not be employed as reliable
indicators of quality or effectiveness. Nevertheless, the so-called relief style of the
5th edition of the Ordnance Survey's One Inch map was abandoned because the
general public bought only one-third of the number sold in the ordinary, non-
relief style which were slightly cheaper. 2 2 Such cases are, however, rare since
official mapping agencies rarely offer a choice of design at any one scale.
Without question the cartographic equivalent of the professional communi
cation expert has become the technically trained and equipped geographer in
volved in designing thematic maps for special purposes. This was certainly not
always the case for Robinson pointed out that the artist was better able than
geographer-cartographers to solve the design problem for many special purpose
maps required in the Second World War. 2 3 Even further back, thematic mapping,
at least of census data, appears to have been the job of the graphic-statistician like
Levasseur. 24 During the 1960s the emergence of a more self-confident and
distinctive cartography, characterized by professional status, research and its own
publications, has been attributed to the influence of the view of the thematic map
as a medium of communication. 2 5 However, for the time being, topographic
mapping tended to be left out of this new view of cartography as "a science, or at
least part of the science of graphic communication". 2
Emboldened by the tacit and increasingly explicit support of other workers,
Robinson and Petchenik felt able to write that "mapping is basically an attempt at
communication between the cartographers and the map percipient" (the one who,
by viewing a map, augments his understanding of the geographical milieu). 27
Such a view embraces general (including topographic) and thematic maps. Similar
views were adopted by Ratajski for whom cartography was "a field of human
activity comprising the creation and functioning of all forms of cartographic
transmission". 28
Morrison has more positively and forcefully argued for a science of
cartography 29 basing his scientific paradigm on papers by Ratajski30 and Koláčný.
He defines it as "the science of communicating information between individuals
by the use of a map". 3 1
Salichtchev also regards cartography as a science but in a rather different way
from Morrison. For him cartography is much broader than that suggested by the
communication science paradigm which is criticized as narrow and technical. In
1970, Salichtchev reproduced his 1967 definition of cartography as "the subject of

the spatial distribution, combinations, and interdependence of nature and society
(and their changes in time) by means of representation through a special symbolic
system - cartographic symbols". 32 He later reiterated its essence as the broader
view of cartography taken in the Soviet Union viz., "a scientific method of under-
standing reality by means of geographical maps as graphic-symbolic spatial mod-
els of the real world". 33 Both of these read like definitions of geography studied by
maps.
T o j u d g e from his critique of cartography at the ICA Conference in Ottawa,
Salichtchev 34 not only considers that the communication science approach to
cartography is narrowly technical but is inseparable from the mathematical theory
of information. That, he argued, cannot explain the increase in information
which occurs in map interpertation, something which Morrison's papers in fact
allowed for, but which he set partly outside cartography as he defined it. 35 For
Morrison the science of cartography begins with the "cognitive realm of the
cartographer" or with his conception of the geographical space and its contents
that he is mapping. It is the detailed study of a communication channel and, as
such, strictly excludes all those processes (map reading, interpretation and analy-
sis) taking place in the cognitive realm of the map reader. Whether we adopt this
narrow view or not, it is obvious even from what Morrison wrote that there is a
constant flux of information passing between the mind of the cartographer and
the real world he is mapping or the map reader for whom the map is intended;
and, at times, cartographers enlarge their own cognitive realms by the very
process of map making.
Thus while Salichtchev's definition of cartography appears to resemble
geography through maps, Morrison's more nearly approaches the Austrian views
of Arnberger and Kretschmer of cartography as a formal science (Formalwissens-
chaft) like mathematics, as opposed to geography which is categorized as an
object-oriented science (Objektwissenshaft). 36
In the Soviet Union according to Frolov the term map science (kartovede-
niye) has become "firmly entrenched as the theory of the science of cartography"
and is inseparable from Salichtchev its major exponent. 3 7 He also considers that
Aslanikashvili's definition of cartography given in Metakartografiya38 does not
really conflict with Salichtchev's. It should, however, be borne in mind that a
substantial section on cartography as a science which appeared in the original
Georgian version 39 was omitted from the Russian version of 1974. Some idea of
the degree of disagreement between Salichtchev and Aslanikashvili can be
gathered from an earlier paper published in Canada. The substance of Salich-
tchev's complaint appears to be that Aslanikashvili thought that cartography in
adopting the map as its subject matter studied itself rather than the real world.
Aslanikashvili defined cartography as "the science which has as its subject cogni-
tion applied with the use of all the scientific-technical methods of cartography".
Salichtchev objected because it did not define cartographic methods but apparent-
ly extended them to include spatial data in digital form. 40
In France, although Moles had firmly regarded cartography as a particular
case of the theory of messages or theory of information, 41 Bertin preferred to
regard it as a method of graphic representation, itself one code employing a
system of signs or symbols and hence a part of semiology. 42
By the mid 1970s it was possible for Robinson and Petchenik to assert
"cartography has opened wide its arms to welcome the concept that it is a com-
munication system". 43 T h e conviction that cartography was concerned with the
transmission of information enabled Ratajski to provide the Working Group of
the International Cartographic Association with strong theoretical underpinning
while recognizing the need for integration between cartology and applied car-
tography. Cartology he regarded as "a system of theoretical cartography ...and,
moreover, the theoretical superstructure of applied cartography", 44 the practical
activities involved in map making. Despite the misgivings over the use of the term
cartology by Robinson and Petchenik 45 and more trenchant criticism by Frolov, 46
the spirit of cartographic science within cartography persists. Robinson and
Petchenik doubt whether the theoretical trend can be resisted. 47 While both the
scientific or theoretical cartographers and the applied or practical cartographers
discuss mutual problems in national and international conferences and meet one
another to review and devise map designs there is little danger of cartography
becoming excessively abstract or of becoming merely a craft.
ATTEMPTS TO MODEL CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
The last fifteen years have witnessed a proliferation of models of the process of
cartographic communication. T o some extent these have evolved incrementally
through another communication process (among the members of an invisible
college of those interested in the topic). Keates was apparently the first specifically
to identify and name the concept of cartographic communication, 48 to link it with
information theory, referring to coding, decoding and the noise affecting the
communication system in a cartographic context. This paper was never published
and the ideas it contained were not elaborated but remained implicit in his later
work. 49
In France, also in 1964, Moles had independently published a paper relating
the theory of information to the transmission of cartographic information, 50 thus
foreshadowing many of the notions found in subsequent attempts to model
systems of cartographic communication. This was apparently quite separate from
efforts by cartographers at that time, but Bertin acknowledges criticism and
advice received from Moles in the preparation of Sémiologie Graphique.51 Whereas
Moles's research appears rooted in information theory, psychology and linguis-
tics, Benin's approach seems more that of the practical cartographer. Notwith-
standing the title of his book, the concept of semiology is employed only as a
general context and is never itself the subject of a diagram or graphical model.
The essence of the approach first appeared in 1966 and was abbreviated as the
introduction to the book itself. Its main significance derives from recognition that
graphic representation whether by maps or diagrams was part of the wider study
of semiology, the science that dealt with systems of signs. Distributed throughout
the profusely illustrated text are various rules of construction and of legibility.
However, these are similar to the principles of visual design referred to by
Robinson. 52 Perhaps it was as much because it was monumental as the fact that it
was written in French that led to its being quoted but otherwise ignored by English
language cartographers, although one reviewer also pointed out that Bertin had
not referred to research in the perception of just noticeable differences and that
the rules offered gave "too little indication of contemporary uncertainties". 53
Despite the late appearance of a notice in the Cartographic Journal another review
er seems to have misunderstood the significance of semiology, which he rendered
as "symptomatology", and hence this too may have further discouraged cartog
raphers from pursuing Bertin's work. 54 This did not affect those in the Nether
lands and Germany, where a translation appeared in 1974.
Information flow models

Although De Lucia's review 55 of models of cartographic communication desig
nated my model of the communication process an engineering-like model, it was
put forward as Robinson and Petchenik correctly state as a broad analogy. 56 Both
that model which was derived essentially from communication theory and the
more complex model attempt to portray a flow of information (Figure 1). 57 The
latter model hints at a progressive loss of information in both map making and
map analysis. Furthermore this model described a cyclical process which includes
a new view of the real world much the same as Koláčný's indicated a discrepancy
between the cartographer's and map user's reality (Figure 2). 58 In the Map-Model
Cycle, however, the discrepancy was not generalized, being split between noise
generated by the map maker and map user, and the deliberate pursuit of scientific
analysis aimed at explaining something from mapped patterns. Whereas the
map-model cycle was closely related to the new paradigm in geography, Koláčný's
was developed quite independently and stems from a decade of research especial
ly with school atlases. Although the focus and top of Koláčný's diagram is "reality",
with the intersecting subsets cartographer's reality and map user's reality, the text
makes it plain that one must start with the cartographer who observes and selects
either directly the "geographical medium", the concrete world of the earth's
surface and/or indirectly maps and other source materials of the same area. In
simplifying Koláčný's diagram to eliminate the reciprocal relationship between
cartographer's reality and the contents of the cartographer's mind and by re
labelling cartographer's reality "mapped part of reality", Salichtchev did less than
FIGURE 1. Board's Map-Model Cycle. See note 57.
justice to Koláčný. 59 There is no reason why the cartographer's reality should not
include both the real world of which he has direct knowledge and the maps and
other data which contribute indirectly. Salichtchev's re-interpretation of Koláčný-
's model is more radically different when it refers to map consumption or map
use. Here Salichtchev's processes of map study and the formation of ideas about
reality derived from the information extracted by the map reader resemble the
right-hand part of the map-model cycle which is concerned with testing the
model. Salichtchev frequently and correctly stresses the importance of this pro
cess and the increase of information which results. "Scientific map making, under
stood as a process of modelling, always aims at a deeper understanding of that part
of reality being investigated and the obtaining of new knowledge about it, i.e., new
information. 60 Koláčný does not fundamentally differ since he refers to the map
user's reality being widened. This exchange of views demonstrates how useful
such models as Koláčný's have been for they focus attention on relationships and
processes rather than merely on the products of those processes. Also, by getting
away from the essentially linear form of the standard or generalized communica
tion systems in particular by building in feedback, models such as this have greatly
helped both map makers and map users to appreciate one another's problems.
C O M M U N I C A T I O N OF CARTOGRAPHIC I N F O R M A T I O N I,
select~ve~nforrnat~on
Is Needs
Interests
Alms
Abll~t~es
and properties
cartographer's rnlnd map users mmd
transforrnatlon Is- Ic o b j e c t ~ f ~ e~nformat~on

d Ic Paycnologicsl
processes
Scope of the meta-languape of cartography
n c u m 2. Board S' model of 1967 contrasted wdh that of KoIdinj (1968).Reproduced from The Cartographic journal, Vol. 6, No. I, I9 69 wzth the publirherk pemirrion.
Such exercises also provide a very valuable link between the more theoretically
minded and the more practically minded cartographers. Koláčný's paper was
originally read to the 4th Technical Conference of the International Cartographic
Association in New Delhi in 1968 and therefore reached a large number of
cartographers before it was published in the Cartographic Journal in 1969 and in
the following year a German translation appeared in the International Yearbook of
Cartography.61 In looking for the sources for KolÓ–áčný's model one is completely
defeated since there are no citations and no evidence to suggest that it is not
completely original. There is certainly little resemblance to Moles's simple model.
By contrast, the map-model cycle evolved over a period of two years of discussion
and reading in an attempt to pull together a widely scattered literature on graphic
representation, cartography, geography, and perception with aid of borrowings
from information and communication theory. At roughly the same time, Wood,
with very similar objectives, pulled together a wider range of literature relevant to
visual perception and map design, asserting the need for a grammar of or rules for
map design. He employs a simple communication model developed by Alexan
der. Wood's paper clearly reflects the views of a practising map maker and map
user and concludes with a specific example of what purports to be an application
of the principles enunciated in the early part of the paper.
Two further and completely independent works, each of which generated
further model building, occurred in the United States (Dornbach, 1969) and
Georgia in the Soviet Union (Aslanikashvili; 1967, 1968). It is quite remarkable
that the mid-1960s yielded so many attempts to bring some order to understand
ing the process of cartographic representation and map use. It is fashionable to
suggest that such a need arose from the very diverse and proliferating literature
on psycho-physical experiments to do with maps, but that would be being wise
after the event. For those who were connected with the exciting movements in
geography, the atmosphere was right and to an extent the temptation to emulate
and imitate other geographers must have been significant. I, for one, acknow
ledge the influence of Bunge's chapter on metacartography (1962) which set me
thinking and provided one possible framework for structuring my own thoughts
and prejudices about map design, the growing volume of research appearing in
the geographical literature on shadings, colour, point symbols and the like. T h e
map-model cycle was written to fit into a volume on models in geography and I,
like other contributors, was expected to take a robustly anti-idiographic line.
Other models have certainly had different origins.
In historical terms the second generation of models is well represented by
Ratajski's (1970, 1972) model of cartographic transmission which acknowledges
the models of 1967–68. Ratajski's model incorporates an interesting notion, by
the angle between the centres of the circles which represent reality, the source of
information and the imagining of reality. He called it "degree of transmission
correctness" and in effect it measures a loss of information. Ratajski spells out in
more detail some of the factors affecting the transmission of information and
expresses many of the concepts in mathematical notation. Finally the diagramma
tic model of cartographic transmission provides the basis for a model of what he
called cartology and then of cartography itself. Cartology was for him, in effect, a
system of theoretical cartography and studied the process of transmitting spatial
information by maps and the relationship between cartography and sciences in
general. This is a theme Ratajski was to return to in 1973 and 1976 but it is not so
central to the subject of this paper.
Among map makers, models such a Koláčný's were received with some
scepticism and were regarded as too complex. 62 But although they may have
preferred Koeman's formulations, 63 they nevertheless quote frequently enough
from Koláčný's to suggest that he had struck the right chords and might have
given two cartographers in one of the world's most famous map making establish
ments cause to reevaluate the process of designing maps for different makers.
In Germany the first substantive reaction to the first wave of model building
was Freitag's paper 6 4 which led on to further development by Hake. 6 5 Freitag's
schematic model incorporates time and may therefore be included among models
of the process of cartographic communication. 6 6 It also links such models with the
notion of cartography as a language by identifying those parts which may be
regarded as syntactics, pragmatics and semantics (Figure 3). In the accompanying
text Freitag carefully explains the relationship between semiology and cartogra
phy, going much further than Bertin. 6 7 Although the model provides for a
continuous repetition of map-making and map using returning to reality from
which new data are obtained for the next cycle, there is no explicit reference to a
discrepancy between the map maker and map user's views of reality. It is a pity that
Freitag's formulation has not become better known. Hake brought automation
into the map making process in his model 6 8 but also makes use of semiological
concepts in his interesting decision-making approach to the achievement of sym
bol perception through map use (Figure 4). 6 9
While the application of linguistic concepts to cartography is dealt with later
in this chapter, some explanation of terms is required at this point in order to
realize the significance of Freitag's and Hake's contributions. Within semiotics, the
theory of signs, three overlapping fields are generally recognized.
Pragmatics is concerned with the relationships between signs and their users. For
cartography it is largely the empirical study of the uses and effects of symbols on
maps.
Semantics is concerned with the relations between signs and the designations of
signs or what is represented by signs. This is to do with the meanings of symbols on
maps in terms of geographical and other concepts about the real world which is
the subject of the map.
Syntactics looks at the relations between signs themselves and concerns rules
abstracted from users of signs and real-world environments. Some map specifica-
FIGURE 3. Freitag's schematic model of the process of cartographic communication. Translated from the original
diagram in his paper "Semiotik und Kartographie", op. cit. Drafted by Mrs Carol Randall, Cartographic Office,
York University.
tions have a strong syntactic component in that relatively arbitrary rules are set
down for the relationships between symbols such as placing the smaller of two
circular symbols which must "overlap" "on top of" the larger. Rules for position-
ing lettering also come into this category. 70
In Hake's model, which is one of the earliest to detail map using activities, the
goal of map use has a prominent and crucial place allowing the map user either to
search actively or to browse (passive perception). After the stage of symbol
perception, understanding symbol structure is labelled syntax, which is followed
in turn by a succession of activities (1) relating symbols with objects (2) explaining
them using the legend (3) explaining them using other aids, all leading to compre-
hending the significance or meaning of the symbols (labelled semantics). Pragma-
tics is reserved for the stage of information processing in the form of map reading
and map measurement (map analysis or cartometry) at which stage the full
FIGURE 4. Process of the recognition of symbols in map evaluation. Translated from Figure 7 of Hake's
paper" Kartographie und Kommunikation", op.cit. Drafted by Mrs Carol Randall, Cartographic Office, York
University.
significance of symbol patterns is related to the features and phenomena of the

real world. At the end of the flow diagram if no further search is undertaken other
non-cartographic activities (e.g., way-finding) may take place.
A third generation of models of cartographic communication may be
identified. This is closely connected with the activities of the ICA Commission on
Cartographic Communication which began to hold regular meetings from 1972 71
onwards, culminating in Ratajski's paper 7 2 which summarized the field as he saw it
in 1977. Not only the formal presentation and discussion of papers but also the
informal contact between members have helped to diffuse the ideas contained in
the earlier papers and relationships between them. To some extent this process
was aided by the preparation of a bibliography of relevant literature 7 3 although
the bulk of the material indexed there consisted of empirical rather than theore-
tical studies. If one were to track the development of any one individual's thought
on modelling cartographic communication one would be able to note the way in
which the ideas of other members of the group had been considered and either
incorporated or reflected. By the mid 1970s the invisible college had become a
visible group widely known internationally. One of its tasks, to which it began to
turn its attention in 1977, was writing a book on the theoretical aspects of carto-
graphic communication, initially the idea and following the plan suggested by
Professor Ratajski. It was accepted then and emphasized later by De Lucia 74 that
despite the efforts of the Commission and others "no consensus or universal
acceptance of any single model" yet existed. Members of the Commission felt that
the lack of consensus, although possibly a healthy sign, may have distracted them
from more important tasks and certainly puzzled cartographers and geographers
outside the group. Nevertheless, the risk of not being aware of the variety of
models, views and terminology rapidly diminished in the late 1970s and more of
the relevant papers were published in the more accessible journals or books.
Language is still a formidable obstacle to understanding and one, therefore, is
glad to see translations of papers, for example, into French 7 5 and the appearance
of a comprehensive review article in Italian. 76 T h e next section will attempt to
group studies of cartographic communication and to suggest directions in which
the field may be moving.
By the mid-1970s any historical account of the development of models of
cartographic communication becomes unmanageable very largely because of
their increasing popularity and the way in which authors making use of them
learn and borrow ideas from one another. One commentator faced with the
proliferation of these models is distressed by being "awash in a sea of scientific-
sounding terminology mostly pirated from other fields such as electrical
engineering. 77 He then went on to categorize and illustrate some of the models in
an attempt to see how much agreement there seemed to be among the theoreti-
cians. In doing this De Lucia relates the models to three levels of communication
problems: A — the technical; B — the semantic; c — effectiveness, and upon these
bases a typology of models. Most of those he selects for review belong to level A,
concerned with how accurately can the symbols be communicated.
In the present review most of the models so far examined also belong to level
A although they have here been termed information flow models. The second
group which De Lucia does not review are those which incorporate the basic ideas
of the information flow models, include the notion of discrepancy between what
information is disseminated and what information is received but which also go on
to generalize about the meaning of the symbols communicated. This last charac
teristic stems chiefly from attempts to model map reading processes. These
models originated in the United States and have now been widely disseminated
through The Nature of Maps.78
Extended information flow models

One further illustration of the development of one group of ideas is provided by
American papers, which examine the stages in communicating geographical
information by means of maps. Convinced of the necessity to distinguish between
map making (the practical side of map production) and cartography, Muehrcke
characterizes the latter as "philosophical and theoretical bases, principles, and
rules for maps and mapping procedures", and by, "conceptual, problem-oriented
research directed at formalizing the science underlying the art of cartography". 79
Having noted the increasing use of communication jargon in the cartographic
literature Muehrcke prefers to regard cartographic processing as an "active
feedback system" involving three transformations:
1 Data collection— Real world to Raw Data

2 Mapping — Data to Map
3 Map Reading — Map to Map Image
with a feedback from the Map Image to the Raw Data. 80 This last is a process of
evaluating the accuracy of the map image. In the same year Joel L. Morrison
presented a paper to the Ottawa Conference of ICA which remarks on the import
ance of works such as that by Koláčný and those shortly to be published by
Muehrcke. By 1973 Morrison had developed a critique of the simple model first
published by Muehrcke which he elaborated in later years. 81 Building on the
essential notion of transformations he shows that those postulated by Muehrcke's
model are much more complicated than they first appear, the second being
composed of two functions and the third, properly regarded as one function, is
not comparable to the former transformation. Morrison expressed these notions
in set-theory terms and explored the stages involved in the process of cartographic
generalization which corresponded to the second of the two functions involved in
the first transformation — data sensed by the cartographer to be included in the
map he is making. T h e three processes involved in generalization:- classification,
simplification and symbolization are shown by Venn diagrams clearly implying a
progressive loss of information. 82 A fourth process, induction, is summoned up

from Robinson and Sale's text on cartography, 8 3 but this is almost an accidental
by-product of the map making process. As Morrison puts it, "in one sense in-
formation is created at this point because this information is not originally part of
the cartographer's reality". 84 Extending his set-theory formulation of the proces-
ses involved in the communication channel Morrison deliberately set out to
elaborate and expand Ratajski's model. 8 5 It recapitulates the basic notions of his
earlier paper but employes a new framework where cartographic science is related
to reality through the cartographer's and the map reader's cognitive realms.
Three divisions are recognized: map generalization; the map itself, the com-
munication channel or cartographic language; and map interpretation. The
relationships between these three are explored in depth with the aid of Venn
diagrams. Morrison then puts forward a systematic structure for perceptual
research in the cartographic language cross-classifying basic map-reading tasks
with the eight symbol "dimensions", characteristics, or visual variables. 86 This idea
was pursued in his paper presented to the Moscow ICA Conference (Morrison,
1977).
Identifying some of the processes in models of cartographic communication

In the meantime, Venn diagrams had also been employed by Robinson and
Petchenik. 87 Although their diagrams appear different from those of Morrison
and use different terms, they are essentially the same. Their earlier paper acknow-
ledges the comments of colleagues and students at Madison, Wisconsin and
therefore is likely to have been contemporaneous with Morrison's diagram which
was originally presented at the London meeting of the Commission on Cartog-
raphic Communication in 1975. For this reason it is not really possible to assign a
priority to either and hence such approaches to the communication process are
perhaps best regarded as products of the Madison school. The idea was, however,
taken up by Board 8 8 who concentrated rather more on aspects of map reading.
Once again the terminology differs from that used by earlier authors, something
only to be expected at this stage in the development of concepts about the process
of cartographic communication, but nevertheless leading to considerable confu-
sion among those who attempt to understand the literature. Even as recently as
1978 Muehrcke felt able to state that most books had done no more than define
map reading, map analysis and map interpretation vaguely and to use these terms
interchangeably. 89 When Morrison pointed out that precise definitions allowed
the classification of processes and the names given to the processes were less
important, he put the stress in the right place. 90 However, he overlooked the risk
of employing unusual names for processes which he was able to define satisfactori-
ly. One immediate difficulty was caused by his employing the term map reader for
the person using the map, but retaining map reading for the more restricted
processes of detection, discrimination, recognition (or cognition) and estimation.
Robinson and Petchenik restricted the term map reading even more, equating it
with actions such as looking u p the name of a city or the height of a hill.91 I have
taken almost the opposite view by including all sorts of map use under the term
map reading. 9 2 It would seem more sensible to return to a more conventional
view, to accept Morrison's broader use of the term map reader but to define map
reading in terms of all the processes beginning with perception of map marks but
excluding the visualization of meaningful patterns or the deliberate comparison
of information received from the map with that already possessed by the map
reader. Map reading would then also exclude visualizing contour patterns as a
three-dimensional landscape, regarded as the final test of map reading by
Sylvester. 93 However, the recognition of individual landforms from contour
patterns could be regarded as map reading (or verbalization). 94 This is a form of
decoding where familiar shapes and combinations of shapes are repeatedly recog-
nized, akin to reading words in a foreign language without knowing what they
signify.95
Few would now accept Garnett's assertion that "the geographical interpreta-
tion of topographical maps consists in the building of a geographical synthesis
from the evidence of the map alone".96 Even she admitted that her definition was
restricted, but it did not by any means exclude the usefulness of previous know-
ledge. For her, geographical interpretation of topographic maps was "applying,
firstly, the art of visualizing the reality from the symbolic representation, and
secondly, the science of establishing causual relations between place and folk". 97
For Dury, map reading was like learning a new language whereas map interpreta-
tion was beginning to speak it and involved "a synthesis in which complex ideas are
deduced and combined from simple ones." 9 8 He saw map analysis as a prelimin-
ary activity, tracing elements of the total pattern appearing on a topographic map.
As such, this mirrors the approach adopted by French geographers who, when
discussing thematic maps, clearly distinguish between analytical mapping and
synthetic mapping. 9 9 T h e former isolate elements or components of the physical,
cultural or economic landscape and one reads them as one would look at classes of
elements in a painting. Synthetic maps demonstrate holistically the realtionships
between these elements and one interprets these by comprehending the complex
ensemble, the structure of the pattern, much as one would appreciate the composi-
tion of a painting. 1 0 0 Morrison's view of map interpretation involves the interac-
tion between information communicated from the map with that previously in the
map reader's cognitive realms, and agrees with Dury's and Muehrcke's
approaches. However, Morrison has an unconventional view of map analysis
which "refers to the resolution of any conflicting information or the substantiation
of new information that forces the map reader to return to reality". 101 He thus
regards verification as map analysis. Before we leave this topic we must surely
accept, with Robinson and Petchenik, that "the word 'reading' is not used in
connection with verbal language to refer to anything less complete than the
apprehension of meaning". 1 0 2 They found, as we have done, that cartographic

practice differed, but suggested two new terms map viewer and map percipient, to
distinguish between the person who merely views a meaningless graphic array
from someone who sees a meaningful figure or pattern on a map. The difficulty of
drawing the distinction in practice nevertheless remains. Few geographers would
be able to look at a map without seeing a meaningful pattern somewhere upon it
and one would like to think that this capability grew with training and experience.
It is nevertheless useful to recognize and maintain the distinction and perhaps to
name each process. T h e fact that map viewing and perception are often virtually
simultaneous and inseparable merely illustrates the limitations of modelling the
process of cartographic communication.
Finally in this section we should bear seriously in mind Guelke's criticism of a
communications model which does not concern itself with the meanings of the
configurations viewed on maps. 1 0 3 As Morrison pointed out map interpretation
takes place within the cognitive realm of the map reader and not in the com-
munication channel. 1 " 4 A narrow view of communication might therefore ex-
clude the assignment of meaning and significance to what was viewed on a map.
Here perhaps Petchenik's characterization of a thematic map as being one "whose
meaning is experienced as knowing-about-space" is useful. 105 This depends upon a
locational base which at its most primitive level enables the map reader to place the
information telling him about a particular segment of geographical space. This
may require no more than a numbered grid or graticule, named relative locations
or a recognizable coastline. Guelke's warning that cartographers should not, by
becoming specialists in graphic communication, neglect the geographical context,
is well taken. There would be no point in being able perfectly to communicate
nonsense. This rather long digression on the processes involved in communica-
tion arose from considering the nature of the information flow models. We have
seen from the discussion, particularly of map reading, that cartographers have
frequently drawn parallels between communicating by mapped information and
by natural language.
MODELLING CARTOGRAPHIC LANGUAGE
This next section explores rather briefly some attempts to model a cartographic
language. It is now generally recognised that this will not be achieved solely by the
use of terms such as syntactics, pragmatics and semantics, although such exercises
may well have drawn some researchers' attention to more fundamental parallels.
Similarly, merely by using words such as semiology or language to cartographic
communication will the attributes of those fields miraculously somehow apply to
maps. Unfortunately, one of the most thoroughly developed arguments, that by
Aslanikashvili, remains virtually inaccessible to workers in the western world. 106
Only an English abstract of a critique in Polish serves to convey any idea of its
6o CHRISTOPHER BOARD
character and even then, working from the Russian version, many of the concepts
are apparently difficult or vague. How tantalizing it is to read that "his preliminary
definition of language based on the notion of concrete space as a subject of
cartographic study... frustrated his attempt to define the subject of cartography
through the analysis of the language of the map. This definition led to
identification of the language of a map with the language of cartography despite
fundamental differences in structure, syntax and function of those languages". 107
Further elaboration of Aslanikashvili's ideas regrettably must await their transla-
tion.
T h e application of the ideas of semiology, the science of signs, to cartography
has been due principally to the efforts of Bertin and his associates, particularly
Bonin. However, Rimbert felt bound to include an appendix on semiology in her
book on thematic cartography. l 0 8 T h e concept of semiology stems from the school
of structural linguistics dominated by Ferdinand de Saussure in Geneva, language
being defined as a semiological system. 109 Although these ideas have been taken
up by some of the French cartographers they have not found favour in many other
countries and do not feature in The Nature of Maps.110 According to Steiner the
concepts of semiotics and semiology "presently flourishing in France" do not have
a universal appeal to experts in linguistics. 111 It seems as if Bertin and his
colleagues have chosen to interpret the process of cartographic communication
formally in terms of semiology. There appears, however, to be little essential
difference between this approach and that of other schools who regard cartogra-
phy as one of the sciences of communication. It is true that to adopt the semiologi-
cal framework requires some use of the jargon of semiology. Although Bertin
employs some of the jargon of semiology he appears to coin his own terms such as
graphic (la graphique) and graphism (le graphisme), monosemic representation,
polysemic and pansemic communication. (At least, no citations are given to other
works which employ these terms.) Perhaps the most explicit explanation of Ber-
tin's position is provided by his book La graphique et le traitement graphique de
l'information.112 Indeed, a close reading of this suggests that Bertin now believes
that the model transmitter code receiver is inappropriate for graphic
representation in general and cartography in particular and prefers to focus in a
"monosemic" fashion on the relationships between data for two (or more) areas
transcribing them into comparable relationships between visual variables without
ambiguity. He identifies three relationships:—
Early Bertin Later Bertin

Niveau qualitatif La ressemblance Similarity
Niveau de l'ordre L'ordre Order
Niveau quantitative La proportionnalité Proportionality
These he calls the three "signifiés" of the graphic, using the Saussurian terminol-
ogy of structural linguistics. These relationships are thus signified by the visual
CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION 6l
variables which are the signs ("signifiants"). T h e cartographer representing such

realtionships has no choice and must follow the rules set out later in the same
chapter, once he has established the "polysemic" or coded relationship between
objects and the kinds of signs used to represent them. However, as
Schlichtmann 113 points out, Bertin does not (despite referring to graphic repre-
sentation as a code in the form of a system of signs) 114 explicitly define the code as
a set of rules for linking expressions and contents. 1 1 5 In his later work Bertin
appears to have shied away from the notion of of the code in this sense and does not
even include the word in the index. As he is at pains to point out that "monosemy"
needs no code, 116 the main burden of his work on the "semiology of the graphic" is
to elaborate the logical rules which govern the transcription of the relationships
between data elements and their graphical representation. 1 1 7 This is not to say
that such an exercise is not of value. The converse is true, but it should not
automatically be assumed that because some of the terminology used appears to
be authentic, the rules conform to or are placed within the realm of semiology as it
has been expounded by linguistic scientists. Nevertheless, Benin's rules do form
part of what might well be regarded as a code.
By identifying the graphic variables (variables visuelles) as early as 1966
Benin pioneered the systematization of the relationships between data and their
graphic representation in an exhaustive manner. 1 1 8 Apart from the two dimen-
sions required to portray plan (x and y) six basic graphic variables are recognized
- size, value, texture, colour, orientation and shape. Colour is considered, for
simplicity's sake, as being without variation in value. These are related to percep-
tion variables (variables rétiniennes) which are concerned with the ways in which
the map reader organizes the graphic elements or map marks into different levels.
These are intimately related to the purpose of the map and the intentions of the
map reader. They are as follows: —
These cannot be equated simply with the scales of measurement for data as
employed by Robinson and Sale, and by Morrison. 1 1 9 T h e difference between
what Benin calls the selective and associative attitudes of the map reader corres-
ponds broadly with analytical and synthetic map use, requiring respectively a
relatively elementary and a higher level (niveau d'ensemble) approach. This
aspect of Benin's work was taken u p by Spiess who concentrated on combinations
of graphic variables 120 and Ratajski who described the combinations of the
graphic variables with three dimensions (point, line and area) as "letters of the
alphabet". 121 Ratajski goes on to borrow linguistic terminology, but draws atten-
tion to one major difficulty, viz., that cartography is a two-dimensional as opposed
to a linear form of expression, a point made more forcibly by Robinson and
Petchenik. 122 Furthermore, although Dacey devotes a whole paper to the linguis-
tic aspects of maps he is under no illusions about the difficulties of developing
appropriate two-dimensional languages for handling geographical information.
Among the number of research problems he sets out are developing procedures
for the syntactic analysis of pictures (and hence maps) and how to specify "a
semantic system for a language whose domain includes individuals whose posi-
tional attributes are as significant as the non-positional attributes". 123 This repre-
sents a line of investigation being actively pursued by Dacey and his associates and
it is likely to be more fruitful than attempts to describe the elements of maps in
linguistic or semiotic terms, without undertaking any further analysis. One in-
teresting contribution from within the cartographic fold has recently been pro-
vided by Schlichtmann who examines the concepts of denotative and connotative
codes and their relevance for mapping and map use. 1 2 4 These codes are respec-
tively denotative (where the immediate meaning of the sign is involved) and
connotative (where the sign's meaning is mediated by a more basic meaning). A
closed contour with a figure inserted in it denotes a line joining a series of points at
the designated vertical distance above or below a datum. It also connotes a
depression from either the context or more likely the convention of how the figure
is positioned relative to the line. But see Phillips's discussion of contour
interpretation. 1 2 5 Outlines indicating ground plans of features may be regarded
as special denotative codes in that they convey to at least some map users specific
features, e.g., islands or states from their distinctive shapes. Schlichtmann resisted
the temptation to adapt Eco's genera] model 1 2 6 to cartographic communication
but is content to pursue the lessons to be derived from linguistics. It is noticeable
that hitherto cartographers are adopting ideas from linguistics, but most authors
on linguistics and semiotics do not cite maps as examples of human communica-
tion. Eco 1 2 7 is an exception but refers only to Bertin's works. Perhaps the complex-
ities of map language have deterred the semiologists. Closer cooperation however
between cartographers and semiologists is a prerequisite for further progress.
Interest in the elaboration of map language continues among cartographers,

particularly in Eastern Europe. Liouty has studied the logical aspects of the "map
sign system" 128 and Pravda 129 has argued that the attempt to identify letters of the
cartographic alphabet by Ratajski and Board 1 3 0 limits further development of the
theory of the cartographic language. Pravda says that this would best be furthered
by recognizing a system at three levels: supply of cartographic signs available for
use; the morphology of cartographic language and, finally, its syntax. The first
level appears to be equivalent to the cartographic alphabet. The second recognizes
three elements: (1) the "cartographeme", the most elementary map mark which
has no significance in itself; (2) the "cartomorpheme" (analogous to the mor-

pheme) recognizable as a separate sign with a significance of its own; and (3) the
"cartosyntagma" an independent sign with unique characteristics which can be
decomposed into its constituent cartomorphemes and, subsequently, carto-
graphemes. One must hope that by recognizing these features one would better be
able to characterize the processes of encoding geographical information in the
cartographic language.
CARTOGRAPHIC S T Y L E AND COMMUNICATION
One comparatively neglected aspect of cartographic communication which can

affect the success with which the message is put over is cartographic style.
Although the concept is commonly applied to lettering which has a special quality
that conveys a distinctive character to a map, there is no question that not only
official topographic maps but coloured thematic maps and even black and white
illustrations in geographical texts demonstrate different styles. Sometimes these
are recognizably "house styles", i.e., similar appearance imposed by the practice
and specifications of publishers. Rimbert introduced the subject of cartographic
style in the context of the subjectivity of the individual map maker but pointed out
that imitation by beginners from the examples placed before them was more
influential than individual differences. 131 Hence one can recognize a newspaper
or a magazine style, that of an urban planner or advertiser, or a Swiss style. (See
here the international recognition given to Schweizer Manier the distinctive repre-
sentation of terrain by a combination of contouring, rock drawing, shading and
tinting associated with Eduard Imhof.) She went on to distinguish between intel-
lectual and manual style. In principle the map author must be concerned with the
former while the cartographic draughtsman should possess or develop the latter
unless his individuality is subjected to the dictates of the organization for which he
works. One other contribution to the discussion of cartographic style has achieved
some prominence but it is not widely quoted, nor does it provide the basis for
futher investigation. Petchnik suggested that the "look" of entire maps, rather
than their elements, be examined through the semantic differential. 132 The scales
developed from word pairs with opposite meanings helped her, as a cartographic
designer of an atlas, to set out her objectives more clearly. They were also useful in
comparing whole maps and defining house styles or the styles of particular
periods of the history of cartography. There are instances in Western Europe
where one can compare the styles of u p to three different agencies for the same
piece of terrain. T h e different appearance of the maps at the same scale is
imparted by specification and house style and must convey quantitatively if not
qualitatively different information. 1 3 3 As Petchenik pointed out, little attention
has been given to the total appearance of entire maps. If one continues to analyse a
map's elements separately there is a risk that the nature of cartographic style and
its influence on communication of geographical information will be ignored. One

promising approach to the evaluation of literary style by Carroll employed factor
analysis on 29 contrasting word pairs and 39 objective measures of 150 passages of
prose to discover whether there was any consistency in and, if so, what were the
bases of subjective ratings by eight competent judges. 1 3 4 Similar subjective ratings
of air navigation charts were carried out by Taylor. 135 Hopkin and Taylor argue
that subjective ratings are complementary to objective performance measures on
the quality of maps. 1 3 6 They should be used together and if their results disagree
this has to be explained. Subjective assessments are also able to tackle those
perceptual aspects of map reading which have no objective counterpart and also
give valuable information on how the map is used by those whose job it is to use it.
Ristow referred to the emergence of a distinctive and original style of map-
making in Fortune "which set the pattern for American journalistic cartogra-
phy" 1 3 7 and no-one could fail to recognize the well-established and highly idiosyn-
cratic style of maps drawn for the National Geographic Society. Although in this
case the house style is such a strong and long-standing influence, in general the
stylistic element in map design may be compared with that in verbal communica-
tion; as such, it represents the deviation from the norm and very much the
expression of the subjective. In J.K. Wright's classic essay 138 cartographic style is
never far from his thoughts and is exemplified best by the parallel he draws with
verbal communication. "The trim, precise, and clean-cut appearance that a well-
drawn map presents lends it an air of scientific authenticity that may or may not be
deserved. A map may be like a person who talks clearly and convincingly on a
subject of which his knowledge is imperfect". If Wright was correct to argue that
an ugly version were less likely to inspire confidence, despite its being as intrinsi-
cally accurate as a beautiful version of the same map, cartographic communicators
should pay more attention to the aesthetic aspects embraced in the concept of
style.
Some who have investigated the effectiveness of maps have argued forcibly
that likes and dislikes, preferences for and attitudes to particular maps influence
their acceptability. Hopkin and Taylor express concern that objective measures of
performance on maps required by ergonomic studies will overlook holistic, aes-
thetic assessments in favour of objective measures of, for example, information
density. 139 They refer to work which suggests that individuals can satisfactorily
assess information density subjectively and go on to suggest that maps might be
improved by reducing the subjective impression of information density while
retaining the original quantity possibly by de-emphasizing some of the detail. In a
practically oriented paper Spiess put forward the hypothesis: "a map that has to be
perceived as a whole may contain, apart from geographic location, only three
additional components, which have to be arranged according to their priority on
three visually separated levels." 140 Complex maps can be so designed to permit the
reader at a glance to perceive the spatial inter-correlations of different compo-
nents. Subjective assessments of whole maps provide an essential avenue towards

testing such hypotheses. Such topics, however, are best discussed under the
heading of the human factors.
CARTOGRAPHY AND INFORMATION THEORY

Although cartographic interest in information theory has emerged in the context
of cartography as communication science most of the accessible literature fits into
the paradigm of structural cartography where the focus is on the representation
of objects in the real world. 141 This is perhaps because it is concerned with the
syntactic level and has attempted to quantify uncertainty in measuring aspects of
map structure and/or content. 1 4 2 Salichtchev and Berlyant reviewed some of the
research in their paper on map u s e ' 4 3 in which it is clear that the major effort is
directed to the analysis of information capacity. They do not, however, mention
two papers which attempt to assess the amount of information conveyed to and
received by the map user, nor do they cite Molineux's experimental study in which
she makes it perfectly clear that an uncertainty measure of the average informa-
tion per symbol does not provide a measure of the information received by the
map reader. Pipkin has set out a methodology for evaluating the residual ignor-
ance of an individual after reading a coloured choropleth map. 1 4 4 It is assumed
that the map reader's information can be indexed by his reproducing "the salient
features of the map (in this case, the color of each region)". Although the pro-
posed model can cope with a situation where the map has n regions and m colours,
there comes a point in the increasing complexity of the map where salient features
should be operationalized in another way. Taylor's evaluation of an experimental
aeronautical chart not only uses an uncertainty measure but places it in a more
realistic context.' 4 5 A series of experiments was devised to assess the degrees to
which symbol identification was correctly performed on two different maps read
under different conditions. Because the number and nature of the possible
meanings which could be attributed to the stimulus symbols corresponded exactly
with those symbols, the results took the form of a matrix of confusions and correct
identifications. These data were then amenable to analysis by Edwards' proce-
dures culminating in values for each main symbol category of the percentage of
perfect information transmission.' 4 6 T h e results were also examined to see
whether identifications were significantly better because the symbols themselves
had been improved on the second map or because the background of the symbols
had been altered. In the experimental design different contexts or background
for each symbol were selected by the extent to which the map reader's ability to
guess correctly what a symbol meant from the geographical context alone could
not be determined.
These two examples, regrettably not yet followed up in the cartographic
literature, point to the validity of using measures based on those used in informa-
tion theory despite criticisms that have been levelled at its use. Salichtchev believed
that "mathematical information theory [was] quite useless" for elucidating the
relationship between that part of reality which is mapped and that which is
recognized from the map since it contends that outgoing information is always less
than incoming information.' 4 7 This is because in map interpretation the experi-
ence and knowledge of the map reader may enable him to use the context of the
symbol to identify it correctly. Robinson and Petchenik accepted Green and
Courtis's objection that two-dimensional displays such as maps and faces cannot
be analysed in the same way as can a coded, sequential message, for which
information theory was developed. 1 4 8 Possibly some adaptation of Taylor's
methodology to the "chunks" of supersigns, the figures, larger-scale features and
associations which experienced map readers may be expected to "see" in the
pattern of a topographic or a complex thematic map. Such developments may well
have to await further research on the nature of map reading processes. It may be
that some of the reconstruction and reproduction tasks used by Steinke and
Epp 1 4 9 for recognizing regions and tracing routes respectively could be employed
with information theory measures. Certainly the relevance and significance of
information theory to cartographic communication is more likely to be established
by testing the models in empirical situations. Failing this, the telling criticisms,
which have had a depressing effect on this aspect of the field, will still exert a
powerful influence, at least on theoretical developments.
THE HUMAN FACTORS APPROACH IN C A R T O G R A P H I C COMMUNICATION
The trend towards functional cartography which regards the map in terms of its
function or purpose was noted by Freitag. 1 5 0 He pointed out that cartographers
would find it difficult to cope with this change and to consider their goal as the
design and form or appearance of the map. Five years earlier, Taylor and
Hopkin 1 5 1 discerned a trend toward interest in the more functional and pragma-
tic criteria than on design procedures related more to aesthetic considerations and
the graphic arts. Reviews of new topographic maps display this shift in interest
between the 1930s and the present day. For them it was no surprise that "the need
for efficient communication of map information to meet the needs of the user was
recognized in aviation cartography long before it was recognized in other areas of
cartography". It was nevertheless necessary for them to draw attention to the
limited application of human factors or ergonomic principles to maps qua maps.
Many of the results from studies of coded displays of information or the legibility
of typography could not automatically be applied to highly complex topographic
maps. It may be that the growing literature of psychological studies on thematic
maps' 5 2 enjoyed greater popularity because the graphic displays involved are
relatively simple. T h e extension of ergonomic principles to map design for va-
rious aspects of aviation has been prompted by the very practical requirements of
highly specialized map users whose technological environment has been changing
extremely rapidly. It owes little to the growth of the theory of cartographic
communication, yet the pragmatism of the human factors approach provides the
best opportunity yet for testing the models and theories which now abound. If
nothing else the growth of communication theory has drawn attention to factors
affecting the loss of information in map design and to the ways in which people use
maps. Had geographers in general retained their once very flourishing interest in
map use, their experience might have been useful in applying ergonomic princi-
ples to map design. However, as was demonstrated above, map techniques were
exchanged for quantitative techniques and, furthermore, geographers them-
selves were never very clear or explicit about what information they expected to
acquire by using maps. T o be truthful, much effort was devoted to interpreting
topographical maps although the acquisition of such skills percolated further
down the educational system in Britain and Canada. Thematic map use seems
largely to have been ignored and is not even strongly featured in Muehrcke's new
text. 153 It was assumed that geographers, perhaps because they so often compiled
thematic maps, also knew how to extract what information from them. One major
exception is McCarthy and Salisbury's now classic study of the comparisons of
isopleth maps; even they felt that it would be naive to ask how the geographer used
maps in his studies. 154 Nevertheless, the introduction to their experimental study
demonstrates clearly that they were aware of the significant role which thematic
maps played in enabling geographers to portray areal distributions, to make
comparisons between different distributions and to communicate this informa-
tion to others. 1 5 5 Unfortunately, their investigation was not pursued by others and
did not appear in the orthodox periodical literature. 1 5 6 This may have been partly
because their results did not support the contention that visual comparisons of
isopleth maps provide an effective means of determining or demonstrating the
degree of association between sets of spatially distributed phenomena. Visual
comparison was an inadequate substitute for measurement: just what the quan-
titative revolutionaries wanted to hear! They did, however, find that even un-
trained students could select the most highly correlated maps from a series of
paired map comparisons, which could be used to suggest further hypotheses and
solutions to geographical problems.
Thereafter, it seems that the interest in studying map use as such shifted from
geography to cartography, although many working in the latter field were trained
as geographers who had specialized in cartography. In the opinion of Hopkin and
Taylor 157 it was those geographers and cartographers who had contributed most
to the human factors studies relevant to maps, by investigating the right sorts of
problems, assisted by reading in the literature of applied psychology. By contrast,
those with professional human factors knowledge had not until now expressed
much interest in maps. In their textbook Human Factors in the Design and Evaluation
of Aviation Maps158 Hopkin and Taylor distill the results of research in ergono-
mics, psychology and cartography to provide recommendations "based on a

thorough analysis of the user's task, his requirements for different information
and his operating environment" for a map "that communicates what the user
needs to know in the most efficient way". 159 Not only have they provided a most
fully documented state of the art but some guidelines in the form of a check-list of
activities which could be used in map design and evaluation. 160 For them, any
design is not an end product but has to be constantly monitored in a systematic
way. This is something which official mapping agencies are beginning to appreci-
ate especially as the need to become cost-effective is impressed upon them. Even
for geographers tempted to illustrate their writings with thematic maps such
pressures are mounting. Cynical members of the geographical profession are still
apt to remark that maps are included in texts because editors expect to see them
there! Why should the following advice given by Hopkin and Taylor to aviation
map makers not apply equally to geographers? 1 6 1 "In designing a map it is
necessary to know how a map will be used. In assessing a map it is equally necessary
to know what the map is for. It cannot be judged in isolation". Much of what they
write can be applied equally well to other special-purpose maps.
Hopkin and Taylor's textbook also contains a chapter, entitled the Com-
munication of Cartographic Communication, which reviews a range of mostly
theoretical work by geographers and cartographers. They find the approach of
modelling information flow useful for structuring that chapter, which serves as a
link between the analysis of the special requirements of aviation maps and the
general principles of design and evaluation of such maps. Without explicitly
stating what role cartographic theory has in their own research the authors
obviously find it easy to articulate their thoughts and findings by examining it in
some detail, although always with their practical objectives to the fore. One section
treats map reading by the user as a decoding process, pointing out that it is an
active process to which the user brings information to supplement that on the
map. Success in map reading depends on much more than correctly using the
legend for decoding individual symbols. Even if the map user searches the map
for a rather specific purpose its ability to attract the attention of the user probably
helps him to build up, visualize and store complex images from groups and
clusters of symbols, or spatial patterns. Consequently, the tasks given to map
readers who are being used to evaluate map designs should be as realistic as
possible combining both symbol-responses and the ability to visualize and make
sense of pattern. T h e present author made an initial attempt to categorize map-
reading tasks in terms of three major purposes for using maps. 1 6 2 These were
navigation or way-finding, measurement and visualization. Each of these involves
a rather different but increasingly more complicated set of operations which
comprise the process of map reading in question. Some of the early psycho-
physical studies on maps employed tests based on tasks which paid little attention
to the purpose for which the maps were originally drawn. Indeed, one might
complain with some justification that much of the research on reading maps
employing proportional symbols' 6 3 does not question the premise that size
estimation is relevant to the purpose of such maps. In the main, the objective of
displaying quantitative data in that way is to emphasize regional differences,
express trends and enable spatial correlations to be undertaken. We do not know
how the map reader's now well-attested inability to make accurate estimates of the
values represented by legends or the ratios between any two district point symbols
affects his ability to construct regional patterns in the ways in which Jenks and
Steinke have attempted to do.16"4
Table I A C H E C K L I S T O F M A P - R E A D I N G TASKS R E L A T E D T O T H E P U R P O S E S F O R W H I C H M A P S ARE M A D E .
Navigation Measurement Visualization
Pre-map reading tasks

Obtain
Unfold X
Orient X ?
Basic/Preliminary map reading tasks
Detect X (x) (x)
Discriminate X (x) x
Recognize X (x) X
Search X X X
Locate X X X
Identify X X X
Delimit ? ? X
Verify X X
Estimation tasks
Count X
Compare or Contrast ? X X
Measure
by direct estimation X X
by indirect estimation X X X
Generalization tasks
Describe X X
Reproduce X
Reconstruct X
Interpolate X X
Morrison re-arranged the tasks originally set out in my paper suggesting that the
more complex tasks were usually composed of combinations of the basic tasks. He
further identified pre-map-reading tasks which he argued were of little conse-
quence to the discussion in his paper, which was to relate the basic and more
complex estimation tasks to scales of measurement and psycho-physical
formulations. 165
In selecting tasks for evaluating maps Hopkin and Taylor 1 6 6 suggest that the
investigator has two alternative strategies. T h e first is to use a group of tasks which
mirror what map users do in the field: the second is to devise tasks to measure basic
map-reading skills which underlie these activities. The first approach has more
validity but is difficult to operationalize and control, even with simulation. The
second is concerned more with the map itself than with all relevant information,
but may not have the same validity although it is easier to obtain measurable
responses. T h e use of simple tasks can be justified only if they make sense in terms
of the ways in which maps are intended to be read or fulfil their purpose.
Way-finding tasks are difficult enough to operationalize but the kinds of visualiza-
tion required by geographers interpreting complex thematic maps, such as those
with cross-classifications on two criteria currently being investigated by Judy
Olson' 6 7 present even more formidable problems. In another area of map use, De
Lucia' 6 8 has applied a battery of tasks to two forms of display used to communi-
cate information in the context of public city planning. More studies of this kind
are needed on different products and circumstances before any general conclu-
sions can be reached on the suitability of particular tasks for investigating the
relative effectiveness of maps.
This brief discussion of map-reading tasks illustrates how theory and practice
can be made to contribute to improving the quality of map design which must
remain the goal of all research on cartographic communication.
I M P L I C A T I O N S FOR GEOGRAPHY
The relevance of cartographic communication for improving map design is, or

should be, obvious, but it is less easy to identify the links between cartographic
communication and geography. T h e professionalization of cartography has
occurred roughly simultaneously with the adoption of the scientific paradigm
within geography. Cartographers have struggled to establish an identity separate
from geographers, explorers or surveyors. Geographers reacting to jibes about
colouring maps, the banality and naivete of cartography' 6 9 can be forgiven for
forsaking conventional maps. For their part, cartographers, especially those in the
area of cartographic communication, have not made as much as they might have
done of mental and cognitive mapping although Barbara Bartz Petchenik's paper
to Autocarto II is a notable exception.' 7 0
There are distinct signs of anxiety among educators that map skills are not
now as well learned or as satisfactorily retained as thay should be. A recent pilot
survey of map skills in a dozen English West Midlands schools found that "it was
apparent that many pupils [in their mid-teens] had forgotten some of the basics of
map reading, such as recognizing conventional signs and giving six-figure grid
references". l 7 1 This was but one disturbing conclusion from a series of test
questions designed to evaluate the map-reading skills and graphicacy attained by
pupils in the final year of compulsory education. The importance of such research
has even now been emphasized by the disclosure that the Ordnance Survey had
been asked to prepare 1:50,000 map extracts for the emergency services with grid
coordinate figures colour coded in red and blue to help eliminate mistakes in
using map references. 172 Since most citizens (not only in Great Britain) receive
their basic training in map use from geography teachers, there still remain several
questions for geographers to answer. Many problems however are recognized,
but the optimum solutions in developing the right skills and training programmes
have yet to be established. One perpetually intractable problem concerns reading
contours to appreciate altitude and relief. As Hill and Burns reported disturbing-
ly in an experiment on topographic map reading, training had little effect on
adults' ability to interpret the shape of the terrain from contour lines whereas it
could improve the identification of objects and the interpretation of feature
symbols. 173 Among cartographers working in the field of communication, topog-
raphic map use is one of the comparatively untouched areas ripe for research and
crying out for cooperation between geographers and cartographers.
This is not to say that all is well with the geographical employment of thematic
maps. Too often maps are poorly designed for use in textbooks, theses or reports
without much consideration for their authors' objectives, if indeed these are ever
properly worked out. Correspondingly little is known of the use to which these
maps are put. 1 7 4 T h e falling real cost of photocopying has led increasingly to the
appearance of reproductions of the small, black and white cartographic illustra-
tions appearing in notes, essays and dissertations, often without further annota-
tion. One suspects that too frequently the spatial patterns and relationships there
portrayed are transferred from the source to the new document without any
adequate mental analysis by its author. If the principles of cartographic com-
munication are to have any real significance for geographers they should throw
light on the nature of map use in geography and lead ultimately to improving map
design in order to increase the flow of information on and appreciation of the
nature of geographical space.
NOTES
1
Richard Hartshorne. The nature of geography. Lancaster: Pennsylvania, 1939, pp. 463–4.
2
William Bunge. Theoretical geography. Lund: C.W.K. Gleerup, 1962, p. 71.
3
J.K. Wright. Map makers are human: comments on the subjective in maps, Geographical Review, Vol
32 (1942) pp. 527-544; Arthur H. Robinson. The Look of Maps. Madison: Wisconsin University Press,
4
S.W. Wooldridge and W.G. East. The spirit and purpose ofgeography. London: Hutchinson, 1951,p.61.
5
Wooldridge and East, op cit., footnote 4, p. 70.
6
F.J. Monkhouse and H.R. Wilkinson. Maps and Diagrams. London: Methuen, 1952, p. v.
7
O.D. Duncan, R.O. Cozzort and B. Duncan. Statistical geography, problems in analyzing areal data. T h e
Free Press of Glencoe Illinois, 1960, p. 15.
8
B.J.L. Berry, in N. Ginsburg, ed. Atlas of economic development. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1961, p. 110 ff.
9
Paul Claval and Jean-Claude Wieber. La cartographie thématique comme méthode de recherche. Paris: Les
Belles Lettres, Cahiers de Géographie de Besançon, no. 18, 1969, p. 183.
10
England and Wales, Department of Education and Science. The teachingof ideas in geography, some
suggestions for the middle and secondary years of education. London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1978,
P. 3.
11
Geographical Association. Evidence submitted by the Geographical Association to Ordnance
Survey Review Committee. Geography, Vol. 63, 1978, p. 374.
12
W.G.V. Balchin. Graphicacy. Geography Vol. 57, 1972, p. 185. This term was coined by W.G.V.
Balchinand A.M. Coleman in an article entitled Educational Supplement November 5, 1965, p. 942 ff. In
a letter to the same journal published on 3 December 1965, K.S. Wheeler reminded its readership that
Dr E.M. Nicholson had suggested there was a need for "some work like cartography to describe literacy
in terms of maps". It was the subject of Balchin's Presidential Address to the Geographical Association
in 1972 and reprinted in revised form as "Graphicacy" The American Cartographer,, Vol. 3 1976 pp.
33–38.
13
A.H. Robinson and B. Bartz Petchenik. The nature of maps: essays toward understanding maps and
mapping. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976, Ch. 5.
14
Robinson, op. cit., footnote 3.
15
J.L. Morrison. Towards a functional definition of the science of cartography with emphasis on map
reading, The American Cartographer, Vol. 5 1978, p. 98.
16
Barbara Bartz Petchenik. From place to space: the psychological achievement of thematic mapping,
The American Cartographer, Vol. 6 1979, p. 11.
17
W.M. Davis. Geography as a university study in Geographical essays, ed. D.W.Johnson. Boston: Ginn
and Company, 1909, p. 189.
18
Alice Garnett. The geographical interpretation of topographical maps. London: George G. Harrap & Co.
Ltd., 1930, p. 25.
19
Arthur H. Robinson. Elements of cartography, 2nd Edition. New York: John Wiley, 1960, p. v.
20
Robinson, op. cit., footnote 3, p. 16.
21
John Barnicoat. A concise history ofposters. London: Thames and Hudson, 1972, p. 81.
22
United Kingdom, Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries. Report on the progress of the Ordnance Survey,
1937–38, p. 5.
23
Robinson, op. cit., footnote 3, p. viii.
24
E. Levasseur. La statistique graphique. Statistical Society of London, Jubilee Volume, 1885, pp.
218–50.
25
J.L. Morrison. Changing philosophical-technical aspects of thematic cartography. Paper presented
to the 6th International Cartographic Conference, Ottawa, August 1972, p. 13.
26
Morrison, op. cit., footnote 25, p. 22.
27
Arthur H. Robinson and Barbara Bartz Petchenik. T h e map as a communication system, The
Cartographic Journal, vol. 12, 1975 p. 14-
28
L. Ratajski. Cartology, Geographia Polonica, vol. 21, p. 64. Ratajski had originally expressed this view
in Polish as "Kartologia.", Polski Przeglad Kartograficzny, vol. 2, 1970, pp. 97–110. He was to some extent
influenced by A. Koláčný's seminal paper, Cartographic Information - a fundamental concept and
term in modern cartography. Prague, 1968, where the latter argued that the process of map produc
tion and consumption or use could best be regarded as a single process "called 'communication of
cartographic informtion'",.
29
J.L. Morrison. T h e science of cartography and its essential processes, International Yearbook of
Cartography, vol. 16, 1976, pp. 8 4 - 9 7 ; Towards a functional definition of the science of cartography
with emphasis on map reading in Festschrift fur Erik Arnberger – Beitrage zur theoretischen Kartographie,
Vienna: Franz Deuticke, 1977 pp. 247–66; op. cit., footnote 15.
30
L. Ratajski. T h e research structure of theoretical cartography, International Yearbook of Cartography,
vol. 13, 1973, pp. 217–228 and Koláčný, op. cit., footnote 28.
31
32
K.A. Salichtchev. T h e subject and method of cartography: contemporary views, The Canadian
Cartographer, vol. 7, 1970, p. 83.
33
K.A. Salichtchev. Cartographic communication/its place in the theory of science, The Canadian
Cartographer, vol. 15, 1978, p. 93.
34
K.A. Salichtchev. Some reflections on the subject and method of cartography after the sixth
International Cartographic Conference, The Canadian Cartographer, vol. 10, 1973, pp. 106–111.
35
J.L. Morrison. A theoretical framework of cartographic generalization with emphasis on the
process of symbolization, International Yearbook of Cartography, vol 14, 1974, p. 120. Morrison, op. cit.,
footnote 29, T h e science of cartography.... pp. 89 and 93.
36
E. Arnberger. Die Kartographie als Wissenschaft und ihre Beziehungen sur Geographie und
Geodäsie, In E. Arnberger, ed., Grundsatzfragen der Kartographie, Vienna: Osterreischischen Geog-
raphishen Gesellschaft, 1970, pp. 1–28.
37
Yu. S. Frolov. Theoretical aspects of the cartographic research method, Soviet Geography, 1979, p.
152.
38
A.F. Aslanikashvili. Metakartografiya Osnovniye Problemi. Tbilisi, Metsniereba, 1968. (English title
given at the end of the book).
40
Salichtchev, op.cit., footnote 32, p. 84.
41
Abraham A. Moles. Théorie de l'information et message cartographique, Science et Enseignement des
Sciences, vol. 5, 1964, p. 11.
42
Jacques Bertin. Le langage graphique et la cartographie, Bulletin du Comité Français de Cartographie,
no. 28, 1966, pp. 6 0 - 6 9 .
43
Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnote 13, p. 25.
44
L. Ratajski. Kartologia, Polski Przeglad, Kartograficzny, vol. 2, 1970, 1980. This was translated into
English to appear as "Cartology", Geographia Polonica vol. 21, 1972, p. 65.
45
See Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnote 13 on p. 20.
46
Frolov, op. cit., footnote 37, p. 151 and p. 153.
47
Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnote 13 on p. 25.
48
J.S. Keates. Cartographic communication. Abstract no. 1034 of a paper presented to the 20th
International Geographical Congress, London, in F.E.I. Hamilton, ed. Abstracts of Papers, London:
Nelson, 1964 p. 9.
49
For example, see J.S. Keates. Cartographic design and production. London: Longman, 1973.
50
Moles, op. cit., footnote 41.
51
Jacques Bertin. Sémiologie graphique. Paris/The Hague: Gauthier-Villars - Mouton, 1967.
52
Robinson, op. cit., footnote 19, pp. 14–15.
53
D.P. Bickmore, in The Geographical Journal, vol. 135, 1969, p. 135.
54
G.B. Lewis, in The Cartographic Journal, vol. 7, 1970, p. 123.
55
Alan De Lucia. Models of cartographic communication: a survey. Paper presented to the Canadian
Cartographic Association, Vancouver, 1978.
56
57
See C. Board. Maps as models, in R.J. Chorley and P. Haggett, eds. Models in geography. London:
Methuen, 1967, Figs 16.1 and 16.2, the former is reproduced here as Figure 1 because it had not been
widely referred to elsewhere. Since the first draft of this paper was written U. Freitag has argued that
the map-model cycle's publication in a non-cartographic volume, its originality, its ambiguous termi
nology and complexity prevented it from becoming a widely accepted concept in cartography. See U.
Freitag, "Can communcation theory form the basis of a general theory of cartography?" Nachrichten
aus dem Karten – und Vermessungswesen, reihe II, vol. 38, 1980 pp. 17–35.
58
Koláčný, op. cit., footnote 28.
59
Salichtchev, op. cit., footnote 34, pp. 108–9.
60
Salichtchev, op. cit., footnote 34, p. 109.
61
A. K o l á č n ý , op. cit., footnote 28. This paper was republished unchanged in The Cartographic
Journal, vol. 6, 1969, pp. 4 7 - 4 9 and as "Kartographische Information - ein Grundbegriff und ein
grundterminus der modernen Kartographie", in the International Yearbook of Cartography; vol. 10, 1970,
pp. 186-193.
62
John C. Bartholomew and I.A. G. Kinniburgh. T h e factor of awareness, The Cartographic Journal,
vol. 10, 1973, pp. 5 9 - 6 2 .
63
C. Koeman. T h e principle of communication in cartography, Interntional Yearbook of Cartography,
vol. 11, 1971, pp. 169–176.
64
U. Freitag. Semiotik und Kartographie: über die Anwendung Kybernetischer Disziplinen in der
theoretischen Kartographie, Kartographische Nachrichten, vol. 21, 1971, pp. 171-182.
65
G. Hake. Kartographie und Kommunikation, Kartographische Nachrichten, vol. 23, 1973, pp. 137-
148.
66
Freitag, op. cit., footnote 64, p. 181.
67
Bertin, op. cit., footnote 51.
68
Hake, op. cit., footnote 65, p. 140.
69
Hake, op. cit., footnote 65, p. 146.
70
These descriptions are based on Colin Cherry. On human communication: a review, a survey, and a
criticism. New York: John Wiley & Sons Inc., Science Editions, 1961, p. 221 ff. M.F. Dacey, Linguistic
aspects of maps and geographic information, Ontario Geography, vol. 5, 1970, pp. 71-80; C. Board.
Cartographic communication and standardization, International Yearbook of Cartography, vol. 13,1973,
pp. 229–238.
71
1972, Ottawa; 1973, Warsaw, 1974, Madrid; 1975 London; 1976, Moscow; 1977, Hamburg; 1978,
Madison; 1979, Bruges; 1980 Tokyo.
72
L. Ratajski. T h e main characteristics of cartographic communication as a part of theoretical
cartography, Interntional Yearbook of Cartography, vol. 18, 1978, pp. 21—32.
73
C. Board, ed. Bibliography of works on cartographic communication. London: International Cartog
raphic Association Commission V, 1976.
74
De Lucia, op. cit., footnote 55.
75
Jean Carré. La communication cartographique, Bulletin du Comité Français de Cartographie, no. 75,
1978.
76
Roberto Melis. Cartografia a scale geografica e scienza della communicazione, Bolletino dell'Asso-
ciazione Italiana di Cartografia, 1979, pp. 5–35.
77
De Lucia, op. cit., footnote 55.
78
Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnote 13.
79
J.P. Muehrcke. Thematic cartography. Washington, D.C.: Commission on College Geography Re
source Paper no. 19, Association of American Geographers, p. 1.
80
Muehrcke, op. cit., footnote 79. Although a reading of Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnote 13,
p. 31 indicates that the model was incorporated in Muehrcke's Ph.D. thesis for the University of
Michigan in 1969, it appears to originate some time before, from a seminar given at the same university
by J.L. Morrison.
81
J.L. Morrison. Towards a schematization of the cartographic process. Paper presented to the NATO
Advanced Study Institute on Design and Analysis of Spatial Data, Nottingham (1973); "The science of
cartography and its essential processes", was originally presented as a paper to the First International
Symposium on Cartographic Communication in London, 1975 and published in the International
Yearbook of Cartography, vol. 16, 1976, pp. 84–97. See also "The relevance of some psychophysical
cartographic research to simple map reading tasks". Paper presented to the 8th Technical Conference
of ICA, Moscow, 1976.
82
83
A.H. Robinson and R.D. Sale. Elements of cartography, 3rd edition. New York: John Wiley, 1969, p.
52.
84
85
Morrison, op. cit., footnote 81. His 1975 and 1976 papers refer to Ratajski, op. cit., footnote 30.
86
See J. Bertin, op. cit., footnote 51, pp. 42–3.
87
Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnotes 27 and 13.
88
C. Board. T h e geographer's contribution to evaluating maps as vehicles for communicating
information, International Yearbook of Cartography, vol. 17 1977, pp. 47–59 see Fig. 1.
89
Phillip C. Muehrcke. Map use: reading, analysis, and interpretation. Madison: J.P. Publications, 1978,
p. viii.
90
Morrison, op. cit., footnote 81, 1976 p. 97.
91
92
Board, op. cit., footnote 88, p. 49.
93
Dorothy Sylvester. Map and landscape. London: George Philip and Son Ltd., 1952, p. 59.
94
Sylvester, op. cit., footnote 93, pp. 36–39.
95
On joining the choir of the University College of Swansea, I quickly became proficient in singing
Welsh hymns but had little idea of what the words meant. Such an activity involves comparatively little
intellectual effort and no doubt is of little worth except for the social experience.
96
Alice Garnett. The geographical interpretation of topographical maps. London: George W. H a r r a p & C o .
Ltd., revised edition 1935, p. 21.
97
Garnett, op. cit., footnote 95, p. 25.
98
George H. Dury. Map interpretation. London: Sir Isaac Pitman and Sons Ltd., 1952 p. 2.
99
Claval and Wieber, op. cit., footnote g, p. 103; and Sylvie Rimbert. Leçons de cartographie thématique.
Paris: Société d'Edition d'Enseignement Supérieur, 1968, pp. 65–70.
100
Claval and Wieber, op. cit., footnote g, p. 8.
101
Morrison, op. cit., footnote 81, 1976 p. 95.
102
103
L. Guelke. Cartographic communication and geographic understanding, The Canadian Cartog-
rapher, vol. 13, 1976, pp. 107–122.
104
Morrison, op. cit., footnote 81, (1976) p. 93.
105
Barbara Bartz Petchenik. From place to space: T h e psychological achievement of thematic
mapping, The American Cartographer, vol. 6, 197g, pp. 5—12.
106
Aslanikashvili, op. cit., footnotes 38 and 39.
107
J. Golaski. Przedmiot ijezyk kartografii wedlug A.F. Aslanikaszwili, (The subject and language of
cartography according to A.F. Aslanikashvili) Polski Przeglad Kartograficzny, vol. 7, 1975, pp. 113–20.
108
Rimbert, op. cit., footnote 99, pp. 111–112.
109
R. Godel. L'école saussurienne de Genève, in C. Mohrmann, A. Sommerfelt and J. Whatnough,
eds. Trends in European and American Linguistics 1930–1960. Utrecht and Antwerp: Spectrum, 1961,
pp. 294–299.
110
Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnote 13.
111
G. Steiner. Linguistics and Literature, in Noel Minnis, ed. Linguistics at large. London: Victor
Gollancz Ltd. p. 123.
112
Jacques Bertin. La graphique et le traitement graphique de l'information. Paris: Flammarion, 1977, pp.
176-232.
113
H. Schlichtmann. Codes in map communication, The Canadian Cartographer, vol. 16, 1979, pp.
81–97.
114
Bertin, op. cit., footnote 51, p. 8.
115
Umberto Eco. A theory of semiotics. London: Macmillan Press Ltd., 1977, pp. 36–37.
116
Jacques Bertin. Theory of communication and theory of "The Graphic", International Yearbook of
Cartography, vol. 18, 1978, p. 1 l9.
117
118
119
Robinson and Sale, op. cit., footnote 83, p. 95; and Morrison, op. cit., footnote 35, pp. 123-126.
120
Ernst Spiess. Eigenschaften von Kombinationer-graphischer Variablen, in E. Arnberger, ed.,
Grundsatsfragen der kartographie, Vienna: Osterreichishen Geographischen Gesellschaft, 1970, pp.
279–293.
121
L. Ratajski. Some aspects of the grammar of map language in terms of cartographic communica-
tion. Paper presented to the First International Symposium on Cartographic Communication, Lon-
don, 1975.
122
Robinson and Petchenik, op. cit., footnote 13, pp. 39, 40.
123
Dacey op. cit., footnote 70, p. 78.
124
Schlichtmann, op. cit., footnote 113.
125
R.J. Phillips. An experiment with contour lines, The Cartographic Journal, vol. 16, 1974, pp. 72-76.
126
Eco, op. cit., footnote 115, p. 141.
127
Eco, op. cit., footnote 115.
128
A. Liouty. To the problem of studying map language. Abstract of a paper offered to the 9th
International Conference on Cartography, College Park, Maryland, 1978. Abstracts of Papers, pp.
50–52.
129
Ján Pravda. Map language: a logical graphic system. Paper presented to the 9th International
Conference on Cartography, College Park, Maryland, 1978.
130
See L. Ratajski. Cartology, its developed concept: the Polish cartography. Warsaw: Head Office of
Geodesy and Cartography, 1976, pp. 7–23; and Board, op. cit., footnote 88.
131
Rimbert, op. cit., footnote 99.
132
Barbara Bartz Petchenik. A verbal approach to characterizing the look of maps, The American
Cartographer, vol. 1, 1974, pp. 63–71.
133
See Karl-Heinz Meine, Kartographische Kommunicationsketten und kartographisches Alphabet:
ein Beitrag zur Theorie der Kartographie, Mitteilungen der Österreichischen Geographischen Gesellschaft,
vol. 116, 1974, p. 405 for an interesting example of maps of three styles for the Basel area of
Switzerland.
134
J.B. Carroll. Vectors of prose style, in T.A. Sebeok, ed., Style in Language. Cambridge, Mas-
sachusetts: M.I.T. Press, 1960, pp. 283–292.
135
R.M. Taylor. An application of subjective scaling techniques to map evaluation, The Cartographic
Journal, vol. 11,1974, pp. 74–81.
136
V.D. Hopkin and R.M. Taylor. Human factors in the design and evaluation of aviation maps. Neuilly-
Sur-Seine: NATO, AGARDograph no. 225 1979, pp. 773–4.
137
W.W. Ristow. Journalistic cartography. Surveying and Mapping, vol. 17, 1957, pp. 369–390.
138
J.K. Wright. Map makers, are human: comments on the subjective in maps, The Geographical
Review, vol. 32, 1942, p. 527. See also, The nature of cartographic communication. Cartographica Mono-
graph, no. 19. Toronto: B.V. Outsell, 1977, pp. 8—25.
139
Hopkin and Taylor, op. cit., footnote 136, 182–3.
140
E. Spiess. Some graphic means to establish visual levels in map design. Paper presented to the 9th
International Cartographic Conference, College Park, Maryland, 1978.
141
U. Freitag. Teaching cartography on the basis of communication theory, ITC Journal 1978–2, pp.
228-242.
142
As suggested by Ann Molineaux, in "Communication theory and its role in cartography". Paper
prepared for the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping, Cartography Division, St. Louis,
March 1974.
143
K.A. Salichtchev and A.M. Berlyant. Methods of map use, 1972-1976. Paper presented to the 8th
International Cartographic Conference, Moscow, 1976.
144
J.S. Pipkin. T h e Map as information channel: ignorance before and after looking at a choropleth
map, The Canadian Cartographer, vol. 12, 1975 pp. 80—82; Some comments on maps and information,
Geographical Analysis, vol. 9, 1977, pp. 187–194.
145
R.M. Taylor. Information theory and map evaluation, International Yearbook of Cartography, vol. 15,
1975, PP. 165–181.
146
Elwyn Edwards. Information transmission. London: Chapman and Hall, 1969.
147
Salichtchev, op. cit., footnote 34, p. 108.
148
Robinson and Petchenik, op. at., footnote 13, pp. 40–41; R.T. Green & M.C. Courtis. Information
theory and figure perception: the metaphor that failed, Acta Psychologica, vol. 25, 1966, pp. 12–36.
149
T.R. Steinke, T h e optional thematic map reading procedure: some clues provided by eye move-
ment recordings, Proceedings, International Symposium on Computer-assisted cartography Auto-
carto II, 1975, pp. 214–223; H.C. Epp. A pilot study on the application of pictographic symbols to
show thru-streets on large scale urban maps, Proceedings, American Congress on Surveying and
Mapping Fall Technical Meeting, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 1978, pp. 125-142.
150
Freitag, op. cit., footnote 141, pp. 238-g.
151
R.M. Taylor and V.D. Hopkin. Human factors principles in map design, Revue de Médecine
Aeronautique et spaciale, no. 49, 1973, pp. 87–91.
152
D. Brandes. T h e present state of perceptual research in cartography, The Cartographic Journal, vol.
13, 1976, pp. 172-6.
153
Muehrcke, op. cit., footnote 89.
154
H.H. McCarty and N.E. Salisbury. Visual comparison of isopleth maps as a means of determining
correlations between spatially distributed phenomena. Iowa City: State University of Iowa, Department of
Geography, Publication no. 3., 1961.
155
McCarty and Salisbury, op. cit., footnote 154, pp. 5–6.
156
This is not strictly true, but the only paper to use the same methodology as McCarty and Salisbury
was devoted to comparisons of line-printer maps and is by a French geographer-cartographer. S.
Rimbert, Des "bruits" qui brouillent les cartes: les insuffisances de la lecture visuelle des cartes
thématiques, L'Espace géographique, vol. 2, 1973, pp. 313—6.
157
Hopkin and Taylor, op. cit., footnote 136, p. 4.
158
Ibid.
159
Taylor and Hopkin, op. cit., footnote 151, p. 87.
160
Hopkin and Taylor, op. cit., footnote 136, pp. 201—4.
161
Ibid., p. 170.
162
C. Board. Map reading tasks appropriate in experimental studies in cartographic communication,
The Canadian Cartographer, vol. 15, 1978, pp. 1-12. This originally appeared as a paper presented to
the First International Symposium on Cartographic Communication, London, 1975.
163
Reviewed very comprehensively by Kang-tsung Chang in "Factors influencing size judgment and
their implications for map design". Paper presented to the 9th International Cartographic Confer-
ence, College Park, Maryland, 1978.
164
G.F. Jenks. T h e evaluation and prediction of visual clustering in maps symbolized with pro-
portional circles, in J.C. Davis and M.J. McCullagh, eds., Display and analysis of spatial data. New York:
John Wiley, 1975, pp. 311–327; Steinke, op. cit., footnote 149.
165
Morrison, op. cit., footnote 29, (1977) pp. 259—265, but especially Table 2, p. 260.
166
Hopkin and Taylor, op. cit., footnote 136, p. 178.
167
J. Olson. T h e effectiveness of a mapping method: the two-variable cross map. Paper presented to
the Harvard Computer Graphics Week, Cambridge, Massachusetts, July, 1978.
168
A.A. De Lucia. An analysis of the communication effectiveness of planning maps, The Canadian
Cartographer, vol. 16, 1979, pp. 168-82.
169
See P.R. Gould. Geography 1957-1977: T h e Augean Period, in Seventy-five years of American
geography, Annals of the Association ofAmerican Geographers, vol. 69, 1979, p. 148. Signals in the noise, in
S. Gale and G. Olsson, eds. Philosophy in geography. Dordrecht, Boston and London: D. Reidel
Publishing Company, 147.
170
B. Bartz Petchenik. Cognition in cartography. Proceedings of the International Symposium on
Computer-assisted Cartography (Auto-Carto II) September 21-25 1975, Falls Church, Virginia,
(American Congress on Surveying and Mapping) pp. 183-193; Gould, op. cit., footnote 163, Geogra-
phy 1957–1977. p. 148. See also, The nature of cartographic communication. Cartographica Monograph
no. 19, Toronto: B.V. Gutsell, 1977, pp. 8-25.
171
D. Boardman and E. Towner, Reading Ordnance Survey maps: some problems of graphicacy,
Birmingham University, Faculty of Education, 1979, p. 73.
172
Ordnance Survey of Great Britain, Consultative Paper no. 80/4, Southampton.
173
A.R. Hill and J.R. Burns. Towards a measure of cartographic competence. Paper presented at the
9th International Conference on Cartography, College Park, Maryland.
174
A problem identified in discussion with George F. Jenks in 1978.
C H R I S T O P H E R B O A R D is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Geography, London School of Economics,

London, England.

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CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION

GEOGRAPHY, MAP USE A N D CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION

Another possible explanation for the recent concentration on simple the-

One of the first to explore the idea of cartography as a science of communication

1970, Salichtchev reproduced his 1967 definition of cartography as "the subject of

ATTEMPTS TO MODEL CARTOGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION

Information flow models

FIGURE 1. Board's Map-Model Cycle. See note 57.

transforrnatlon Is- Ic o b j e c t ~ f ~ e~nformat~on

Scope of the meta-languape of cartography

significance of symbol patterns is related to the features and phenomena of the

Extended information flow models

1 Data collection— Real world to Raw Data

progressive loss of information. 82 A fourth process, induction, is summoned up

Identifying some of the processes in models of cartographic communication

apprehension of meaning". 1 0 2 They found, as we have done, that cartographic

MODELLING CARTOGRAPHIC LANGUAGE

Early Bertin Later Bertin

variables which are the signs ("signifiants"). T h e cartographer representing such

Interest in the elaboration of map language continues among cartographers,

has no significance in itself; (2) the "cartomorpheme" (analogous to the mor-

CARTOGRAPHIC S T Y L E AND COMMUNICATION

One comparatively neglected aspect of cartographic communication which can

its influence on communication of geographical information will be ignored. One

nents. Subjective assessments of whole maps provide an essential avenue towards

CARTOGRAPHY AND INFORMATION THEORY

THE HUMAN FACTORS APPROACH IN C A R T O G R A P H I C COMMUNICATION

mics, psychology and cartography to provide recommendations "based on a

Table I A C H E C K L I S T O F M A P - R E A D I N G TASKS R E L A T E D T O T H E P U R P O S E S F O R W H I C H M A P S ARE M A D E .

Navigation Measurement Visualization

Pre-map reading tasks

The relevance of cartographic communication for improving map design is, or

C H R I S T O P H E R B O A R D is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Geography, London School of Economics,

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