News and Announcements

Specialist Meeting on Spatial Thinking Across the College Curriculum

Dates: December 10–11, 2012

Location: Santa Barbara

This 2-day specialist meeting was conceived and organized by The Center for Spatial Studies (spatial@ucsb) at the University of California, Santa Barbara(UCSB), and The Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center (SILC), based at Temple University. Spatial@ucsb is dedicated to promoting campus-wide spatially related events, research, and teaching for all disciplines that share interest in the importance of spatial thinking in science and in artistic endeavors, the development of spatial analytic tools, and the importance of place in society.

Call for papers (PDF)

Final Report (PDF)

Specialist Meeting on Spatial Demography

Dates: December 12–13, 2011

Location: Santa Barbara

A two-day workshop for the presentation, discussion, and summarization of current challenges and opportunities for spatial demography.

Call for papers (PDF)

Final Report (PDF)

OpenGeoDa short course with Luc Anselin

Dates: December 5-7, 2011

Location: Tempe, AZ (Phoenix metro area, USA)

This short course provides an introduction to spatial analysis using the latest version of the cross-platform OpenGeoDa software. The focus is on two important topics. The first is the concept, statistical tests for and interpretation of spatial autocorrelation, one of the most fundamental notions in spatial analysis. The second deals with the principles behind spatial regression, especially how to carry out and interpret diagnostics for spatial autocorrelation and how to estimate models that incorporate such spatial correlation

Learn more about the short course and register here: https://www.introgeoda.com/.

Future Directions in Spatial Demography
Call for résumé/position paper due September 30, 2011

A two-day workshop for the presentation, discussion, and summarization of current challenges and opportunities for spatial demography   View the Flyer

Specific questions to be addressed include:

• How are demographers measuring place and the interrelationships among places?
• How can demographers harness emerging developments in the generation of geospatial data (e.g., volunteered geographic information and crowd-sourced data)?
• How can new measures be validated for use in neighborhood and contextual research?
• What visualization and spatial analytical methods make up the current tool kit of the spatial demographer? What new methodological developments in spatial analysis are possible in the next five years and how might these be integrated into mainstream demographic research?
• What are the training challenges to the enhancement of future research in spatial demography?
• What research priorities will best advance the applicability of spatial demography to address issues in reproductive health, population health, and other areas of societal need?

Based on an open call for applications, approximately 30 researchers will be invited to participate in the meeting. The organizing committee is chaired by Michael F. Goodchild (UCSB), Donald Janelle (UCSB), and Stephen Matthews (PSU).

Call for Applications

To respond to this announcement, please send a two-page résumé and a two-page position paper discussing your interest in these issues to Stephen Matthews, , by Sept. 30, 2011. Participants will be selected by the organizing committee and notified by Oct. 15. Funding to cover travel and accommodation costs will be available to invited participants. Further details about this meeting will be posted at
http://ncgia.ucsb.edu/projects/spatial_demography.

*NICHD 5R25 HD057002-04. See https://csiss.org/GISPopSci

AJPM theme issue on GIS and Childhood Obesity
Call for abstracts/paper outlines due March 31, 2011

The American Journal of Preventive Medicine will publish a theme issue on GIS-related technologies and childhood obesity in early 2012. We are seeking original papers on childhood obesity research that draw on the innovative use of geospatial technologies, data, and spatial analytical methods.

For consideration in the theme issue potential authors are asked to submit by March 31, 2011 a 300-word abstract/paper outline to the guest editor, Stephen A. Matthews (E-mail: ). All abstracts/paper outlines will be reviewed. The authors of selected abstracts/paper outlines will be contacted in mid-April and invited to submit a full paper (2,500 words) by July 1, 2011. For consideration in the theme issue the full manuscript must be received by this date. Each manuscript will be subject to peer review. Author instructions for submissions to AJPM can be found at http://www.ajpm-online.net.

For this theme issue we especially welcome empirical papers on research methods that seek to advance the field of childhood obesity. We welcome submissions in the following primary topic areas:

• Trends, patterns and consequences of childhood obesity
• Theoretical, conceptual and methodological issues in defining the obesogenic environments of children
• Innovation in measuring obesogenic environments (using GIS, GPS and related technologies)
• Innovation in, and utilization of, emerging geospatial data on obesogenic environments
• Measuring childhood exposure to obesogenic environments (using GPS and integrated technologies)
• Use of advanced spatial statistical methods in childhood obesity research
• Future challenges: theoretical, conceptual, data, methods, training and community resources

Questions about the theme issue may be directed to Stephen A. Matthews, Associate Professor of Sociology, Anthropology and Demography and Academic Director of the Geographic Information Analysis Core at the Population Research Institute and the Social Science Research Institute, Penn State (E-mail: or phone (814) 863-9721).

Advances in Spatial Regression Analysis

Dates: January 12-15, 2009

Location: Arizona State University in Tempe, AZ (Phoenix metro area, USA)

The GeoDa Center for Geospatial Analysis and Computation at Arizona State University has announced a four-day workshop "Advances in Spatial Regression Analysis" with Luc Anselin. Participation is possible in person or online (real-time or on your own time). For details go to http://geodacenter.asu.edu/learning/workshops.

New PhD program in Spatially Integrated Social Science at the University of Toledo - Call for posters on SISS at AAG 2009

ANNOUNCEMENT. AAG 2009 Las Vegas. Special Illustrated Poster Session in Spatially Integrated Social Science. In recognition of the new PhD program at the University of Toledo in Spatially Integrated Social Science (SISS) this session will consist of illustrated poster presentations focusing on all aspects of SISS. Topics to include (but not limited to): Cartographic visualization, geographic information systems (GIS), pattern recognition, spatially statistical analysis, spatial econometrics, spatial simulation & spatial-temporal dynamics, spatial optimization & spatial interaction modeling, and the application of spatial techniques to address social science problems and social issues. Interested presenters should send abstracts to */_by October 9th_/*. All authors will be responsible for formal submission of their abstracts and registration for the AAG 2009 conference via the conference website at www.aag.org.

GISPopSci Participants Awarded Hewlett/PRB Dissertation Fellowships

The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Population Reference Bureau offer two-year dissertation fellowships for research that examines how population dynamics, family planning, and reproductive health influence economic development, including economic growth, poverty reduction, and equity. Two of the five awardees announced for 2006 have affiliation with the GIS Population Science workshops.
Ernesto Amaral, a Ph.D. candidate from the University of Texas at Austin, participated in the 2005 GISPopSci workshop at Pennsylvania State University. His dissertation is titled "Demographic Transition & Economic Development at the Local Level in Brazil". Ernesto received his B.A. in Social Science from the Federal University of Goiàs, Brazil and his M.A. in demography from the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil. His research and teaching interests include demography, fertility, and migration.
Tony Ao, a Ph.D. candidate in Population and International Health at the Harvard School of Public Health, is a participant in the 2006 GISPopSci workshop at the University of California, Santa Barbara. The title of his dissertation is "Microeconomic Impact of HIV Disease Among Female Bar/Hotel Workers in Tanzania". For two years before entering the doctoral program, Tony worked and lived in Moshi, Tanzania helping to set up the Kilimanjaro Reproductive Health Program.

Mapping the Future of World Population

Population Action International, in collaboration with the Center for Climate Systems Research at Columbia University, has just completed a new population projection map. "Mapping the Future" is a first-of-its-kind, high-resolution map of projected population change for the year 2025.

GIS at Albany

The Center for Social and Demographic Analysis and the Lewis Mumford Center have created a new GIS, web-based system, which is now up and running in a beta version and available for people to try.
The 2000+ system is designed to provide easy access to the most up-to-date social, economic, and demographic characteristics of U.S. counties, including the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Surveys and population estimates. The creation of 2000+ involved a joint effort by the two centers at the University at Albany; the design team was led by me, Dr. Glenn Deane and Jin-Wook Lee, and the programming was carried out by Josh Pierro. You can access the beta version of 2000+at http://mumford.albany.edu/2000plus/.

The Proceeedings of the National Academy of sciences of the United States of America (PNAS)

Included is a Spatial Demography Special Feature (October 25, 2006). This issue included commentaries and articles by Kenneth W. Wachter, Susan Hanson, William A.V. Clark, David A. Plane et al, Peter A. Rogerson and Daejong Kim, Mark Ellis and Richard Wright, Benjamin Forest, and Leah K. VanWey et al..

American Journal of Preventive Medicine

included a supplement on Prostate Cancer and GIS (Guest Editors: Thomas B. Richards, Linda W. Pickle, and Gerald Rushton) February 2006.

Spatial Economic Analysis Journal

A new journal has been launched called Spatial Economic Analysis
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/17421772.asp. The editor is Bernie Fingleton (University of Cambridge).
A call for papers is available at http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/cfp/rseacfp.pdf

GeoDa™ Workbook Available

"Exploring Spatial Data with GeoDa: A Workbook", the first complete version of the GeoDa™ workbook is now available for free download (5.1MB). It contains 244 pages with 25 chapters of step by step guidelines and exercises to learn all the features of GeoDa, including spatial regression analysis.

Download the Workbook