作为新一代地理分析工具,虚拟地理环境对于增强人类地理认知、分析解决地理问题方面具有显著优势。目前虚拟地理环境的基本框架、实现技术均有较多论述与成果。但在虚拟地理环境的认知研究方面尚缺乏有效指导。为提高虚拟地理环境构建的科学性,本文通过对虚拟地理环境现有概念的分析,提出从系统论角度进行虚拟地理环境认知研究的观点;并对虚拟地理环境的认知与地理认知、地图认知等相近概念进行了对比分析。从现实环境与虚拟环境间的相似性入手建立了虚拟地理环境的认知研究框架,该框架从思维相似、感觉相似、几何相似、特性相似和离散相似5个方面探讨了虚拟地理环境认知研究目前的着眼点,并将思维相似作为虚拟地理环境认知研究的重点与难点。该框架将虚拟地理环境的认知问题置于一个更广泛背景中进行研究,一方面体现了虚拟地理环境所具有的地理实验研究新平台的作用,另一方面重点强调了人的作用,对深入开展虚拟地理环境的研究具有重要意义。

As a next generation geographic analysis tool, Virtual Geographic Environments (VGEs) have remarkable predominance in enhancing human cognition of the geographic world and in solving geographic problems. Most studies currently focused on VGE structures and technologies. However, research productions on basic theory, such as geographic semantics and data representation models, are few. In particular, the weakness of VGE cognitive theory has restrained the further development of VGEs.VGE cognition attempts to improve the usability, efficiency, equity, and profitability of VGEs with geo-knowledge obtained through the synthesized research of human geographic cognition rules, as well as the VGE nature and building methods. This research provides not only an effective guide to VGE construction but also theoretical and methodological guidance to the geographic cognition, geographic analysis, and modeling of remote sensing information. This article reviews several understandings of VGEs and suggests that cognition research on VGEs should be derived from the perspective of system theory to contribute to the future scientific deve-lopment of VGEs. From this perspective, VGEs are complex systems of human environments, virtual environments created by computers, and realistic environments. The differences between the cognition of VGEs and other similar concepts are discussed to draw their clear boundaries. Geographic and map cognition are important bases of VGE cognition, but developing a new cognitive research framework of VGEs in reference to VGE characteristics are necessary. Thus, a cognitive research framework is developed from similarities that include thinking, perception, geometry, characteristic, and discreteness similarities in both realistic and vir-tual environments. Thinking similarity is the emphasis and the difficulty of VGE cognitive research. It is also the basis of building VGEs that are consistent with human cognition. The course of human cognition is through image schema, category, conception, and meaning. Thus, thinking similarity should include the specialization of human cognition models on geographic environments, context model building of VGEs, computer model of geographic concepts, and formalization and contextualized representation of geographic models. Perception similarity is an important factor in generating immersion and is a key to distinguishing VGEs and other spatial cognition tools. Thus, the multi-modal interaction, dynamic representation adaptability, cognitive load, and work efficiency experimentation of VGEs should be studied. VGEs should balance realistic representation and non-realistic representation, which is called realistic representation adaptability to geometry similarity. Given the multi-scale characteristic and scale dependence of both the geographic process and study method, characteristic similarity should include multiple-scale adaptability and representation of formalization models. VGE uncertainty is produced when discrete geographic data are translated into a continuous spatial-time process representation, which is lacking in VGE research. Based on the above framework, VGE cognitive research is placed in its wider context. The function of the geographic experiment platform of VGEs and human function in VGEs is also emphasized. This study has a large significance in deepening VGE research.