Space-Time Behavior Research and Application in China - Space-Time Integration in Geography and GIScience - page 21

experiences on a micro scale and urban social and spatial transformations on a macro
scale. The space-time behavior approach was introduced to China in this context and
has subsequently been widely applied to empirical research and planning practices.
In 1996, the National Natural Science Foundation of China sponsored the first urban
geography research that adopted a time-geographic framework. Since then, more
than 100 academic research articles have been published in Chinese and English,
presenting empirical studies on coastal cities (e.g., Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai,
Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Nanjing) and inland cities (e.g., Wuhan, Urumqi, Lanzhou).
Aimed at promoting better communication and exchange among urban geogra-
phers from different contexts, this article provides a critical overview of space-time
behavior research in China's urban geography. We first present a brief history of
space-time behavior research in China, focusing on key methodological progress
such as collection of high-quality space-time data and development of GIS-based
analytic techniques. This summary is followed by a review of applications of space-
time behavior approach to empirical studies and planning practices in Chinese
cities. We argue that space-time behavior research offers a new perspective for
understanding the complexity and diversity of human behavior patterns during
the large-scale spatial and institutional transition in these cities. While learning
from the west, improvement of data quality and analytic tools has facilitated
GIS-based geovisualization of space-time activity patterns in Chinese cities and
improved understanding of space-time behavior decision within constraints by the
built environment. Nonetheless, we also recognize that while the techniques and
tools used in space-time behavior research in China have caught up with that in the
West, its theoretical development still lags behind.

3.2 Theoretical Introduction and Methodological Progress

3.2.1 Introduction of the Space-Time Behavior Approach

to China

In Western countries, space-time behavior research had achieved a great deal of
theoretical progress by the 1990s, but limitations in data quality and analytical
techniques led to a period of relative stagnation in empirical studies (Kwan 2004 ;
Shaw 2012 ). Nonetheless, it was during the 1990s that time geography and the
space-time behavior approaches were introduced to China, where they met with
a growing interest in Chinese urban geography.
To be sure, the space-time behavior research in China has benefited by learning
from the fruitful theoretical progress and empirical applications made in Western
geographical research. Academic journals in China have published a series of
articles in the late 1990s that introduce key concepts, theoretical arguments, and
empirical studies in Sweden, America and Japan (e.g., Chai and Wang 1997 ;
Chai 1998 ;Chaietal. 2000 ), and more recently in 2009 and 2010 that further