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626 wayfinding
wayfinding
The issue of orientation or finding one's way in an
unfamiliar environment is frequently a concern
for the independent traveller. Much of the early
research on wayfinding for tourists has been
conducted in large indoor settings such as museums
and art galleries. If much mental effort is
spent negotiating the labyrinths of the building,
little capacity remains for attending to the exhibits
and the whole experience may be diminished.
Visitors who cannot successfully use the cues, signs,
maps and diagrams of the setting may miss
exhibits they want to see, spend time in parts of the
building where the exhibits are of lesser interest,
and fail to locate essential services such as food and
toilets. The issue of wayfinding extends beyond
buildings to the use of subways and airports, and to
open air settings such as theme parks and touring
by automobile.
Much of the research on wayfinding has been
directed at identifying the value of good maps and
orientation aids �signs, route markers). Specific
experimental studies have begun to identify the
features of maps which make them most informative
in public settings. One broad hypothesis
integrating these specific findings is the notion of
cognitive steps, where this term refers to a mental
transformation of information from the language
of the map to the reality the viewer can be
expected to encounter. The core-integrating
hypothesis is that maps with fewer cognitive steps
are preferred and promote better wayfinding. For
example, any map drawn in two dimensions is a
cognitive step away from the three-dimensional
world the individual has to encounter. In general
three-dimensional maps are likely to be preferred
to two-dimensional abstract maps. Other examples
of cognitive steps, with the more difficult element
being mentioned first, include black and white
maps as opposed to colour, rotated as opposed to
fixed ones oriented in the same direction as the
viewer and an indexed system as opposed to names
on the map. The evidence is consistent with the
view that such cognitive steps take longer to process
and information obtained from these types is
harder to remember.
In addition to maps and signposting devices,
good architectural design of tourism facilities can
promote easy wayfinding. Both within buildings
and in open air environments, clearly visible routes
and prominent landmarks aid visitor orientation.
In novel settings such as unfamiliar cities, there is
some evidence that tourists build up a list of
landmarks first and then connect them with routes
and paths. There may be some gender differences
in wayfinding, with males showing some greater
use of paths and female tourists relying more on
landmarks.
weekend
PHILIP L. PEARCE, AUSTRALIA
The weekend forms one of the basic components of
people's opportunity for leisure time and for short
touristic trips, including visiting friends and
relatives. It generally consists of a one and onehalf
or two-day period at the end of a five-day
working week. In its modern form, it evolved in the
United Kingdom during the 1870s; the earliest use
of the term, according to the Oxford English
Dictionary, was in 1879. The custom of a weekend
break spread to Europe and North America largely
after the First World War. Today, the weekend has
become not simply the end of the week but has
gained its own distinct significance in people's
leisure lives.
It was industrial societies which developed the
clearly defined weekend. Pressure for regulated
work schedules eroded previous customs of free
time, leaving Sunday as the only frequent period
free from labour. But in the United Kingdom from
the mid-nineteenth century, a movement grew to
make Saturday a half-holiday. The Factory Act of
1850 ended work at 2 pm on Saturday. By the
1890s, a one and a half day holiday was the norm.
This distinctive UK habit spread slowly to Europe
and North America from the 1920s and 1930s. In
1935, Italy adopted a one and one-half day
weekend, and Germany did so after 1945. In
France, le weekend of two days grew in the 1950s and
1960s.
However, the weekend has never been universally
adopted. Japan has been slow to accept this
Western custom, and a Friday and Saturday
weekend was not common in Israel until the