Qualitative GIS to Relate Perceptions with Behaviors among Fishers on Risky, Rocky Coasts

Abstract

This article presents an innovative mixed methodology that integrates qualitative geographic information systes (GIS) methods to expand the examination of space in the context of people’s lived experiences and risk. We emphasize the specific ways in which individuals perceive risk by treating risk as relational. Conceptualizing risk as relational challenges traditional assumptions of risk by rejecting that risk is the combination of physical and social elements. Instead, a relational understanding explores the socioenvironmental interactions that are perceived as hazardous, as they emerge in space. Such claims have long animated risk research, but only recently have methodological advances o..