Verification of Geographic Laws Hidden in Textual Space and Analysis of Spatial Interaction Patterns of Information Flow

Abstract

The rapid development of Internet technology has formed a huge virtual information space. In the information space, information flow has become a link of communication between objects. Information flow is an alternative or supplement to the traditional physical flow for the study of the spatial interaction of geographical entities. The research uses toponym co-occurrence and search index as information flow data, verifies the geographical laws hidden in the information space by spatial autocorrelation analysis and gravity model fitting, and analyzes the spatial interaction patterns of provinces in China in the information space by complex network analysis methods. The results show that: (1) information flow in the information space obeys Tobler’s first law of geography and Goodchild’s second law of geography. The spatial interaction represented by information flow has a distance decay effect. The best distance decay coefficients for toponym co-occurrence and the search index are 0.189 and 0.186, respectively. (2) The inter-provincial spatial interaction network of China shows a hierarchical pattern of the triangular primary network and diamond secondary network, and the ranking of provinces in the centrality analysis is basically stable, but the network hierarchy is deepening. The gravity center of spatial interaction is located in the east-central region of China. (3) The information flow-based interaction network is of higher asymmetry than the population mobility network, and its spatial structure is also obvious. This research provides a new idea for studying the spatial interaction of geographical entities in the physical world from the perspective of information flow.