Mental Maps and Daily Travel: Qualitative Exploration and Modelling Framework

Abstract

Activity based models of travel demand generally rely on broad assumptions about human behaviour. This research aims at establishing a better representation of true behavioural mechanisms underlying activity-travel scheduling. More specifically, the integration of ‘mental map’ characteristics is sought. This ‘mental map’ notion covers both individual’s mental model of decision problems and individual’s cognition of space.

First, the mental map in daily travel is explored. Therefore, 20 respondents keep a diary during one week, and they are interviewed. Hence, the routine nature of daily travel is revealed. Based on the findings of this qualitative research, a computational concept is developed in the second phase to model the routine mental map of a single individual. As an example, the work-related travel choices of a mother of 3 young children are modelled in a Bayesian decision network. To enable further generalization of this individual model, normal work and school routines of young households are mapped based on population data in the final phase. This way, family patterns are developed that are used to benchmark the outcome of the FEATHERS model of travel demand for Flanders. Ultimately, these patterns can be implemented as skeletons in the model to improve its behavioural realism.