Analyzing Children’s Mental Maps through Lynch’s Imageability and Matthews’ Typology: A Mixed-Methods Study of Urban Neighborhoods in Algeria
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22452/Keywords:
Spatial cognition, Children's Mental Maps, Neighborhood Morphology, Urban Imageability, Mixed-methods design, AlgeriaAbstract
This study investigates how children perceive and cognitively represent their urban neighborhoods through the analysis of mental maps. The research was conducted with 100 children aged 9–11 years from two different types of neighborhoods in Batna, Algeria. The study adopts an integrated mixed-methods framework combining Lynch’s (1960) theory of urban imageability and Matthews’ (1992) representational typology to analyze both the spatial content and representational forms of children’s drawings. Quantitative analysis based on Lynch’s framework revealed that landmarks and paths dominate children’s spatial representations, appearing in 91% and 83% of the drawings respectively. MANOVA results demonstrated a significant effect of neighborhood morphology on children’s spatial representations (Pillai’s Trace = 0.211, F (5,84) = 4.489, p = 0.001, η² = 0.211). In contrast, age and gender showed limited overall effects. Qualitative analysis revealed that the progression toward schematic representations was not solely associated with age-related cognitive development but was also linked to neighborhood morphology, indicating that the configuration of the built environment plays an important role in shaping how children organize and internalize spatial information. To deepen the interpretation of representational patterns, the study employed a complementary coding framework based on ten analytical axes addressing dimensions such as spatial organization, detail, perspective, labeling, and social interaction. The findings reveal that both developmental progression and neighborhood form jointly contribute to the way children construct and express spatial representations. The study contributes empirical evidence from the Algerian context and highlights the importance of legible and child-sensitive urban environments in supporting children’s spatial cognition and environmental engagement.
