Papers by Anthony Robinson
Faceted search is a common approach for helping users query multivariate data. While the method i... more Faceted search is a common approach for helping users query multivariate data. While the method is found widely in contemporary tools, so far there has been little exploration of its potential to incorporate a spatial perspective. In this article we extend multivariate faceted search through the application of a brute force computational process to reveal facet combinations that have spatially-interesting results. We explore the potential utility of spatially-enhanced facet combinations in case study analyses of multivariate spatial data from learners in a massive open online course and multivariate spatial data from restaurant inspections. Spatiallyenhanced facet combinations improve on ordinary faceted search by helping analysts understand which combinations have significant spatial footprints. We also show how this method can be integrated into a geovisual analytics system through a simple user interface. Finally, we draw on our case study analyses to highlight important challenges and opportunities for future research. (A.C. Robinson), [email protected] (S.D. Quinn).
Geographic information is commonly disseminated and consumed via visual representations of featur... more Geographic information is commonly disseminated and consumed via visual representations of features and their environmental context on maps. Map design inherently involves generalizing reality, and one method by which mapmakers do so is through the use of symbols to represent features. Here we focus on the challenges associated with supporting mapmakers who need to work together to reach consensus on standardizing their map symbols.
ABSTRACT A key advantage of interactive geovisualization tools is that users are able to quickly ... more ABSTRACT A key advantage of interactive geovisualization tools is that users are able to quickly view data observations across multiple views. This is usually supported with a transient visual effect applied around the edges of an object during a mouse selection or rollover. This effect, commonly called highlighting, has not received much attention in geovisualization research. Today, most geovisualization tools rely on simple color-based highlighting.
Abstract Geographically-grounded situational awareness (SA) is critical to crisis management and ... more Abstract Geographically-grounded situational awareness (SA) is critical to crisis management and is essential in many other decision making domains that range from infectious disease monitoring, through regional planning, to political campaigning. Social media are becoming an important information input to support situational assessment (to produce awareness) in all domains. Here, we present a geovisual analytics approach to supporting SA for crisis events using one source of social media, Twitter.
Information …, Jan 1, 2007
Cartography and …, Jan 1, 2005
Geovisualization tools are intended to support analysts in complex task domains like crisis manag... more Geovisualization tools are intended to support analysts in complex task domains like crisis management, disease surveillance, and threat analysis. It is likely that analysts in these domains will use geovisualizations to develop many analytical results over time. This calls for attention to the problem of collecting, organizing, and making sense out of groups of analytical results–a stage of analysis called synthesis.
ABSTRACT Geospatially-oriented social media communications have emerged as a common information r... more ABSTRACT Geospatially-oriented social media communications have emerged as a common information resource to support crisis management. Our research compares the capabilities of two popular systems used to collect and visualize such information-Project Epic's Tweak the Tweet (TtT) and Ushahidi.
In this paper, we present the GeoViz Toolkit (GVT), an open-source, Internet-delivered program fo... more In this paper, we present the GeoViz Toolkit (GVT), an open-source, Internet-delivered program for geographic visualization and analysis that features a diverse set of software components which can be flexibly combined by users who do not have programming expertise.
This research employs a mixed qualitative method study to characterize and design for geovisual s... more This research employs a mixed qualitative method study to characterize and design for geovisual synthesis. Interviews were conducted with analysts at PNNL to characterize how synthesis is conducted currently and to elicit opinions about how synthesis should be supported in the future. Individual and collaborative synthesis experiments were conducted with participants from PNNL, CIDD, and GeoVISTA to observe synthesis in a simulated real-world scenario.
Abstract Standardizing and coordinating information is a key challenge for supporting effective e... more Abstract Standardizing and coordinating information is a key challenge for supporting effective emergency management practices. Conventions can be established to ensure collaborators can find common ground quickly during an emergency, but developing such conventions remains difficult amidst continual evolution and diversification in information sources and products.
Abstract Interactive mapping and spatial analysis tools are under-utilized by health researchers ... more Abstract Interactive mapping and spatial analysis tools are under-utilized by health researchers and decision-makers as a result of scarce training materials, few examples demonstrating the successful use of geographic visualization, and poor mechanisms for sharing results generated by geovisualization.
Abstract Analysts are faced with increasing volume and complexity of spatially and spatio-tempora... more Abstract Analysts are faced with increasing volume and complexity of spatially and spatio-temporally referenced events to analyze. One means of taming this volume and complexity is to develop methods and tools that can identify patterns, including spatio-temporal structure like clusters, in event data. To understand these methods and tools, we first present some of the motivation for the work, and then we detail the software architecture that we will use to support categorical analysis of spatio-temporal events.
Abstract: Emergency management in transnational contexts can be a challenging endeavour. Cultural... more Abstract: Emergency management in transnational contexts can be a challenging endeavour. Cultural and language differences among multiple countries can hinder the exchange of information during dynamic emergency response. With increasing international threats and the explosion of near real-time data availability, the emergency response process has become mired in complex communication practices.
Abstract: The conceptualization of spatio-temporal information is an interdisciplinary research a... more Abstract: The conceptualization of spatio-temporal information is an interdisciplinary research area. The focus of this article is on human conceptualizations of spatio-temporal geographic phenomena (also referred to as events). Identifying and understanding human conceptualizations is a crucial component in defining the semantics of spatio-temporal information. However, most research focuses primarily on how humans imbue dynamic phenomena with meaning on a general level.
Abstract TexPlorer is an integrated system for exploring and analyzing large amounts of text docu... more Abstract TexPlorer is an integrated system for exploring and analyzing large amounts of text documents. The data processing modules of TexPlorer consist of named entity extraction, entity relation extraction, hierarchical clustering, and text summarization tools. Using a timeline tool, tree-view, table-view, and concept maps, TexPlorer provides an analytical interface for exploring a set of text documents from different perspectives and allows users to explore vast amount of text documents efficiently.
Abstract One often cited advantage of coordinated geovisualizations is that users are able to qui... more Abstract One often cited advantage of coordinated geovisualizations is that users are able to quickly view data elements from multiple perspectives. This is typically supported by providing a special visual cue during rollover on a data element. This cue, commonly called highlighting, can be defined as the transient visual effect that is applied on data items across views when a mouse cursor or other input device has moved overhead.
Abstract The Pennsylvania Cancer Atlas (PA-CA) is an interactive online atlas intended to help po... more Abstract The Pennsylvania Cancer Atlas (PA-CA) is an interactive online atlas intended to help policy-makers, program managers, and epidemiologists with their tasks related to cancer prevention and control. The PA-CA is designed to support exploratory analysis and decisionmaking with spatio-temporal cancer data. To assess the usability of the initial versions of the PACA, we are soliciting user feedback through multiple distributed focus groups and surveys.
ABSTRACT Current GIS solutions for evacuation planning are frequently based on expensive and diff... more ABSTRACT Current GIS solutions for evacuation planning are frequently based on expensive and difficult to use commercial software solutions. These tools require a GIS analyst to generate and interpret results for decision makers. This paper introduces a web-based interactive mapping tool called EvacSpace that can provide emergency managers with actionable spatial information to develop plans for potential citizen evacuations in common emergency situations.
ABSTRACT A wide range of local, regional, and federal authorities will generate maps to help resp... more ABSTRACT A wide range of local, regional, and federal authorities will generate maps to help respond to and recover from a disaster. It is essential that map users in an emergency situation can readily understand what they are seeing on these maps. Standardizing map symbology is one mechanism for ensuring that geospatial information is interpretable during an emergency situation, but creating an effective map symbol standard is a complex and evolving task.
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Papers by Anthony Robinson