MENTAL MAPS AND FUZZINESS IN-SPACE PREFERENCES

Mental maps are widely used to represent aggregate residential prefere nces in a population. This study examines the contention by researcher s that the dominant viewpoint in a group in terms of residential desir ability is not affected by the fuzziness in individual space preferenc es. Results indicate that a significant misrepresentation of group pre ferences can result when fuzziness of individual preferences is overlo oked. The use of ordinal scales to generate mental maps is likely to d istort the actual pattern of residential preferences that dominates in the group because of the failure of the ranking approach to account f or imprecision and ambiguity in individual preferences. Because interv al scales used in rating or evaluating tasks do not force individuals to give a crisp judgement of places, they are more adequate than ordin al scales for mental mapping and for behavioral analysis.