Spatial Choice Research Articles

Social effects on rat spatial choice in an open field task

Pairs of rats foraged in trials either together or separately in an open field apparatus for pellets hidden in discreet locations in a 5 × 5 matrix. Trial duration was either 1 or 4 min. The tendency to choose locations that had earlier been visited by another rat was examined by comparing the choices made in the presence and absence of the other rat. Rats avoided visits to locations that had earlier been visited by the other rat, but only if they had also visited the same location earlier in a short duration trial. This pattern of results is consistent with earlier findings from experiments using the radial arm maze. Furthermore, when rats did visit locations that had earlier been visited by the other rat in a long duration trial, they tended to be locations that had been visited longer ago by the other rat than would be expected. This suggests a forgetting function for social memories. These data provide evidence that the social memory reported in earlier studies using the radial-arm maze can be found in other experimental paradigms and that at least some of its properties are common in the two paradigms.

Measuring marginal predation in animal groups

Predation is a major pressure that shapes animal sociality, but predation risk is not homogenous within groups. Animals located on the group edge typically face an increased threat of predation, although different patterns have been reported. We created a simulation model to determine how changes in predator attack distance and prey density influence predation in relation to within-group spatial position. At large attack distances, peripheral animals were attacked far more than central animals. At relatively short attack distances, central individuals were attacked almost as often as peripheral animals. We used 6 different methods to classify within-group spatial position in our simulations and tested which methods were the best predictors of predation risk at different parameter values. The minimum convex polygon and angle of vulnerability methods were the best predictors of predation risk at large and medium attack distances, respectively. At relatively short attack distances, the nearest neighbor distance and neighbor density methods were the best predictors of predation risk. These patterns demonstrate that the threat of marginal predation is dependent on the behavior of predators and that for some predator–prey systems, marginal predation is predicted to be insignificant. We predict that social prey animals should change antipredatory behavior, such as vigilance, within-group spacing, and within-group spatial choice based on the relative distances at which their predators attack. These results demonstrate the importance of incorporating the behavior of predators in empirical studies and predator–prey models.

Social Influences on Rat Spatial Choice

Social Influences on Rat Spatial Choice by Michael F. Brown, Villanova University Reading Options: Download/Read PDF | Add to Endnote Abstract Although there is abundant evidence for social learning and other forms of social influence on behavior, relatively little experimental analysis of the mechanisms involved is available.

Dynamic Choice Set Generation Based on Global Positioning System Trajectories and Stated Preference Data

A method that generated choice sets for commuters in the Munich, Germany, metropolitan area was explored. The method used Global Positioning System trajectories and interview data from 300 commuters over an 8-week survey to combine chosen, known, and generated routes into choice sets for route choice modeling. The method used revealed preference routes as well as stated preference routes to calculate accepted detour factors, which were then used as boundary conditions for choice set generation using path enumeration. On the basis of a spatial choice set, the method generated time-dependent choice sets by attributing all routes with actual travel times at the time traveled.

Spatial Choices of Middle Classes

Middle classes attracted attention in literature in the recent periods due to their expanding nature based on new job descriptions depending on the dynamics of the economy. They had used to have no significance in classical class schemes apart from being a group stuck in between the bourgeoisie and proletariat, and performing those jobs that could be categorized in neither side. However, with changes in the economic order in recent years, the meaning of work changed along with the variety of jobs to be performed. It is commonly known that these new conditions are very much related to technological advance providing heightened mobility to capital, labour and information. Changes in the regime of capital accumulation fuelled by new opportunities changed the sphere of work to a great extent. Developments in the arena of work and employment are revealed with the changes in the occupational structure and growth of a white-collar workforce. Apart from a wide range of low paid, and low skill service sector jobs, a wide variety of management, finance, technology and service related high level jobs which required high level training began to be demanded. ‘New middle classes’ came out as a result of such developments. Defining these newcomers became a central issue of research in many fields, but their significance came not only of the jobs they fulfilled or their role in the production sphere. Their consumption patterns, thus lifestyles became a central issue of interest. This may be mainly because class in the classical understanding defines a group with common interests, but these new middle classes did not have any common goal to fight for. What they had in common was where they stood in the production sided class schemes, between the upper and lower classes, but still their jobs were highly varied. In the occupational aggregate approach, classes are defined by occupational groupings at the expense of other factors (Akpinar, 2005). However, today, in the new economic climate, work lost its capacity in shaping people’s lives (2005). Modern society was a work society according to Offe (1985). However, today in the so-called SPATIAL CHOICES OF MIDDLE CLASSES

Spatial choice is biased by chemical cues from conspecifics in the speckeled worm eel Myrophis punctatus

The speckeld worm eel Myrophis punctatus lives in high-densities assemblages, and usually digs through, or lies on the substrate. These behaviours could lead to chemical marks on the substrate and could modulate the spatial distribution in this species. We tested the hypothesis that the spatial choice of the speckled worm eel is modulated by the presence of conspecific odour on the substrate. Here, we showed that the speckled worm eel avoids the substrate area containing the conspecific odour, indicating that this chemical cue modulates the eel's spatial decision. The eels clearly detected the conspecific's odour. This perception might indicate the presence of conspecifics into the substrate. Since the eels avoided an area containing conspecific odour, we suggest this may be a response that avoids the consequences of invading a resident-animal's territory.

Within-group spatial position in ring-tailed coatis: balancing predation, feeding competition, and social competition

A variety of factors can influence an individual’s choice of within-group spatial position. For terrestrial social animals, predation, feeding success, and social competition are thought to be three of the most important variables. The relative importance of these three factors was investigated in groups of ring-tailed coatis (Nasua nasua) in Iguazu, Argentina. Different age/sex classes responded differently to these three variables. Coatis were found in close proximity to their own age/sex class more often than random, and three out of four age/sex classes were found to exhibit within-group spatial position preferences which differed from random. Juveniles were located more often at the front edge and were rarely found at the back of the group. Juveniles appeared to choose spatial locations based on feeding success and not predation avoidance. Since juveniles are the most susceptible to predation and presumably have less prior knowledge of food source location, these results have important implications in relation to predator-sensitive foraging and models of democratic group leadership. Subadults were subordinate to adult females, and their relationships were characterized by high levels of aggression. This aggression was especially common during the first half of the coati year (Nov–April), and subadults were more peripheralized during this time period. Subadults likely chose spatial positions to avoid aggression and were actively excluded from the center of the group by adult females. In the Iguazu coati groups, it appeared that food acquisition and social agonism were the major determinants driving spatial choice, while predation played little or no role. This paper demonstrates that within-group spatial structure can be a complex process shaped by differences in body size and nutritional requirements, food patch size and depletion rate, and social dominance status. How and why these factors interact is important to understanding the costs and benefits of sociality and emergent properties of animal group formation.

Associative symmetry and stimulus-class formation by pigeons: The role of non-reinforced baseline relations

Two experiments tested the assumption of Urcuioli's (2008) theory of pigeons' equivalence-class formation that consistent non-reinforcement of certain stimulus combinations in successive matching juxtaposed with consistent reinforcement of other combinations generates stimulus classes containing the elements of the reinforced combinations. In Experiment 1, pigeons were concurrently trained on symbolic (AB) and two identity (AA and BB) successive tasks in which half of all identity trials ended in non-reinforcement but all AB trials were reinforced, contingent upon either responding or not responding to the comparisons. Subsequent symmetry (BA) probe trials showed evidence of symmetry in one of four pigeons. In Experiment 2, pigeons learned three pair-comparison tasks in which left versus right spatial choices were reinforced after the various sample-comparison combinations comprising AB, AA, and BB conditional discriminations. Non-differentially reinforced BA probe trials following acquisition showed some indication of symmetrical choice responding. The overall results contradict the theoretical predictions derived from Urcuioli (2008) and those from Experiment 2 challenge other stimulus-class analyses as well.

3D Isotropic Dispersion (ID)-FDTD Algorithm: Update Equation and Characteristics Analysis

Three 3D isotropic dispersion-finite-difference time-domain (ID-FDTD) algorithms are formulated based on two new spatial difference equations. The difference equations approximate the spatial derivatives in Maxwell's equation using more spatial sampling points distributed in an isotropic manner. The final spatial difference equation is a weighted summation of the two new difference and the conventional central difference equations. Therefore, based on the proposed spatial difference equation and choices of the weighting factors, seven different FDTD schemes can be formulated, which include the Yee scheme. Among the seven schemes, three methods can show isotropy of the dispersion superior to that of the Yee scheme. The weighting factors for the three schemes are numerically determined to minimize the anisotropy of the dispersion by using an optimization technique. In this paper, the dispersion & stability characteristics and the numerical complexity of the three ID-FDTD schemes are addressed. Also, the upper bound of the Courant number of the three ID-FDTD schemes is heuristically proposed and numerically verified. One scattering problem is considered to show the improved accuracy of the proposed ID-FDTD scheme.

A Spatial Multidimensional Unfolding Choice Model for Examining the Heterogeneous Expressions of Sports Fan Avidity

The sports industry is one of the ten largest business sectors in the U.S., and its primary source of revenue is derived from sports fans. Yet, little has been published in the academic journals about fans' allocation of time, effort, and/or financial expenditures in regard to the sports they care so desperately about. The objective of this research is to uncover the multidimensional aspects of the observed manifestations of fan avidity, and explore the nature of the heterogeneity of such expressions. Data were collected from a student sample of football fans from a well-known university. Thirty-five different expressions of fan avidity were uncovered related to how these fans follow and support their football team. A spatial choice multidimensional unfolding model is developed and reveals four latent dimensions of fan avidity expression. The managerial aspects of these empirical findings are provided, as well as several directions for future research.

Spatial Econometrics Approach to Integration of Behavioral Biases in Travel Demand Analysis

Random utility models customarily assume strict independence of individual decision makers. Evidence of crowding, peer pressure, herd behavior, and other instances of spontaneous discrete choice coordination indicates that decision makers interact and thus affect choices made by others. Socially influenced individual choices become biased toward either agreeing with or contradicting the choices made by peers. Because many social interdependencies are spatial, a basic spatial discrete choice model was obtained by extending random utility theory to discrete choices made by heterogeneous spatially dependent individuals. Although interdependencies are unobserved, the model permits the study of behavioral biases arising from spatial interdependencies. The spatial discrete choice model is shown to address the effects of behavioral biases on conditional choice probabilities, the marginal effects of exogenous variables on revealed preferences, and the spatial patterns of discrete choices. A pseudo maximum likelihood (PML) estimator for the model is developed, and closed-form expressions for conditional choice probability estimates are derived. The PML estimator is shown to be consistent and computationally feasible for large spatial data sets. Simulated data were used to illustrate the performance of the PML estimator for the spatial discrete choice model.

Modeling Micro-Level Crime Location Choice: Application of the Discrete Choice Framework to Crime at Places

Discrete choice recently emerged as a new framework for analyzing criminal location decisions, but has thus far only been used to study the choice amongst large areas like census tracts. Because offenders also make target selection decisions at much lower levels of spatial aggregation, the present study analyzes the location choices of offenders at detailed spatial resolutions: the average unit of analysis is an area of only 18 residential units and 40 residents. This article reviews the discrete choice and spatial choice literature, justifies the use of geographic units this small, and argues that because small spatial units depend strongly on their environment, models are needed that take into account spatial interdependence. To illustrate these points, burglary location choice data from the Netherlands are analyzed with discrete choice models, including the spatial competition model.

Residents' Attitudes Toward Casino Gambling in Kyrenia, North Cyprus: In Search of Theoretical Explanation?

This study attempts to explore the residents' perception of casino gambling tourism in the coastal resort city of Kyrenia in north Cyprus (TRNC). After the closure of casinos in Turkey in the 1990s, Kyrenia became a spatial choice by the gambling industry and with the cooperation of the government in north Cyprus, the city has become home to the casino gambling tourism that has mushroomed in and around the city. The casino gambling tourism has been perceived as an agent of economic growth by the investors from outside and the indigenous policy makers inside. To explore the residents' attitudes towards gambling in their community, a survey questionnaire was administered to a non-randomly selected sample of residents in Kyrenia, and Spearman's Rho correlation tests were used to explore the relationships between community concerns, socioeconomic concerns, and community attachment as main constructs to evaluate residents' attitudes towards casino gambling. Overall, 32 items were used to explore linkages between the mentioned three constructs/community concerns, and casino gambling-related attitudes. Results indicate that the residents, by overwhelming majority, are negative about casino gambling in their community. Whilst residents are not in favor of banning casino gambling, they perceive casino gambling not as an engine of economic growth, but rather as a political and economic project that has bypassed their concerns and alienated their rights to be involved and to participate in the process. Therefore, the results revealed that residents have not been an equal partner in the process and have remained an outsider to casino gambling—that employed and was implemented as a “growth machine.” The results also indicate that the “growth machine” theory stands tall and explains the case of Kyrenia in comparison to the economic dependency, social exchange, and to the community attachment theories. The study also provides an insight into residents' attitudes toward the issue of growth and development within a community as a result of a specific form of tourism—casino gambling.

Exploring and simulating the regularities in intra-urban population density structure

Sizes in a system of cities follow the so-called rank–size distribution or the more general Zipf's law. Previous research demonstrates that the rank–size relationship can be explained and simulated by a rather simple spatial choice model, describing individual residential behavior across cities. In studying population density within each of the 20 largest metropolitan areas in the United States, we discovered another type of regularity: population density at the tract level and the logarithm of the rank by tract density within a city exhibit a linear relationship. We call this rank–density regularity. In this article, we explore whether the simple spatial choice model originally developed to simulate city size distribution at the inter-urban scale can be used at the intra-urban scale to explain the rank–density pattern and the formation of urban density structure. We found that after adjusting the simple model for the city-edge constraint, the model can simulate the rank–density relationship reasonably well. In order to depict the spatial structure of population density more realistically, the model must include sub-centers, which increase the complexity of the model. Overall, the spatial choice model can reproduce the rank–density structure quite well. We believe the model captures the dominant forces in the formation of the population density distribution at the intra-urban scale.

A Statistical Threat Assessment

Criminal gangs, insurgent groups, and terror networks demonstrate observable preferences in selecting the sites where they commit their crimes. Accordingly, police departments, military organizations, and intelligence agencies seek to learn these preferences and identify locations with a high probability of experiencing the particular event of interest in the near future. Often, such agencies are keen not just to predict the spatial pattern of future events but even more importantly to conduct threat assessments of particular criminal gangs or insurgent groups. These threat assessments include identifying where each of the various groups presents the greatest threat to the community, what the most likely targets are for each criminal group, what makes one location more likely to experience an attack than another, and how to most efficiently allocate resources to address the specific threats to the community. Previous research has demonstrated that applying multivariate prediction models to relate features in an area to the occurrence of crimes offers an improvement in predictive performance over traditional methods of hot-spot analysis. This paper introduces the application of multilevel modeling to these multivariate spatial choice models, demonstrating that it is possible to significantly improve the predictive performance of the spatial choice models for individual groups and leverage that information to provide improved threat assessments of the criminal elements in a given geographic area.

Spatial decisions and cognitive strategies of monkeys and humans based on abstract spatial stimuli in rotation test

We showed previously that macaque monkeys (Macaca mulatta) could orient in real space using abstract visual stimuli presented on a computer screen. They made correct choices according to both spatial stimuli (designed as an abstract representation of a real space) and nonspatial stimuli (pictures lacking any inner configuration information). However, we suggested that there were differences in processing spatial and nonspatial stimuli. In the present experiment we show that monkeys could also use as a cue abstract spatial stimuli rotated with respect to the real response space. We studied the ability of monkeys to decode abstract spatial information provided in one spatial frame (computer screen) and to perform spatial choices in another spatial frame (touch panel separated from the screen). We analyzed how the monkeys were affected by the type of training, whether they perceived the stimuli as "spatial" or "nonspatial," and which cues they used to decode them. We compared humans to monkeys in a similar test to find out which cognitive strategy they used and whether they perceive spatial stimuli in the same way. We demonstrated that there were two possible strategies to solve the task, simple "fitting" ignoring rotations and "remapping," when the stimulus was represented as an "abstract space" per se.

Photographing a City: An Analysis of Place Concepts Based on Spatial Choices

We ask whether the photographs published in web-based image collections do represent different conceptualizations of a city and present a method for gathering and analyzing a data set of more than 12,000 images from Amsterdam, Bamberg, Cardiff, and Dublin. We then propose a measure for the popularity of a location in a city. The analysis of the data set reveals that the popularity follows a power law with very few highly popular locations and a long tail of places in a city that are visited only occasionally. The most popular locations can be identified with the semantic core of the conceptualization of the city in terms of images. This raises the issue of individual differences. We propose another measure that permits to identify users with similar conceptualizations of a city.

Social effects on spatial choice in the radial arm maze

Social memory was investigated in the context of a spatial working memory task. Pairs of rats were tested in an eight-arm radial maze. Under most conditions, there was a tendency to choose maze locations that had been visited earlier by the other rat. The possibility that this tendency is produced by common preferences for particular maze locations was ruled out. An opposite tendency to avoid visits to locations that had been visited earlier during the trial by another rat was found only when the maze location contained two pellets (rather than an undepletable supply), the rats' ability to see each other in the maze was restricted to the central arena, and the maze location had been previously visited by the focal rat. The amount of food available in maze locations did not otherwise modulate social influences on spatial choice. The results indicate that memory for a rat's own previous choices is combined with memory for the choices made by another rat.

Formal Evaluation of the Impact of Barriers and Connectors on Residential Burglars' Macro-Level Offending Location Choices

Previous research evaluating burglars' offending location choices has produced mixed findings about the influence of physical barriers and connectors on offender movement patterns. Consequently, this article utilises the discrete spatial choice approach to formally evaluate the impact of barriers and connectors on residential burglars' macro-level offending location choices. Data from Perth, Western Australia, demonstrated that physical barriers and connectors exert significant influence on offender decision-making at this level, and that the influence of impermeable barriers increases with proximity of these obstacles to the offender's point of origin. These findings provide formalised evidence for the independent importance of physical barriers and connectors in offender movement and are discussed with respect to current environmental criminology theory.

A Code for Spatial Alternation During Fixation in Rat Hippocampal CA1 Neurons

The classical notion of hippocampal CA1 "place cells," whose activity tracks physical locations, has undergone substantial revision in recent years. Here, we provide further evidence of an abstract spatial code in hippocampal CA1, which relies on memory and adds complexity to the basic "place cell." Using a nose-poking paradigm with four male Wistar rats, we specifically concentrated on activity during fixation, when the rat was immobile and waiting for the next task event in a memory-guided spatial alternation task. The rat had to alternate between choosing the right and left holes on a trial-by-trial basis, without any sensory cue, and relying on an internal representation of the sequence of trials. Twelve tetrodes were chronically implanted for single-unit recording in the right CA1 of each rat. We focus on 76 single neurons that showed significant activation during the fixation period compared with baseline activity between trials. Among these 76 fixation neurons, we observed 38 neurons that systematically changed their fixation activity as a function of the alternation sequence. That is, even though these rats were immobile during the fixation period, the neurons fired differently for trials in which the next spatial choice should be left (i.e., RIGHT-TO-LEFT trials) compared with trials in which the next spatial choice should be right (i.e., LEFT-TO-RIGHT trials), or vice versa. Our results imply that these neurons maintain a sequential code of the required spatial response during the alternation task and thus provide abstract information, derived from memory, that can be used for efficient navigation.