AP Human Geography Unit 1 (1.1 - 1.7) Vocab

Built environment

The physical artifacts that humans have created and that form part of the landscape in their understanding of land use.

Census Data

Commonly used for research of population, business marketing, and planning, providing a sampling frame such as an address register.

Contagious Diffusion

A type of expansion diffusion where all individuals and areas outward from the source region are affected.

Contour Map

Lines drawn to represent a consistent height above sea level.

Cultural ecology

A geographic approach that emphasizes human-environment relationships.

Cultural Hearths

Areas where civilizations first began that radiated customs, innovations, and ideologies that culturally transformed the world.

Cultural Landscape

Modifications of the natural landscape by human activities.

Cultural Traits

A single attribute of a culture.

Distance decay

The concept where the further things are apart, the less connected they tend to be.

Distribution

The way a phenomenon is spread out or arranged over an area to describe patterns.

Environmental determinism

The belief that landforms and climate are the most powerful forces shaping human behavior and societal development while ignoring the influence of culture.

Environmental possibilism

A view that acknowledges limits on the effects of the natural environment and focuses more on the role that human culture plays.

Formal (Uniform) Region

An area in which everyone shares in common one or more distinctive characteristics.

Functional (Nodal) Region

An area organized around a node or focal point.

Geographic Perspective

Where and how something occurs with the physical environment.

Geographic scale

Refers to the area of the world being studied.

Human environment interaction

The study of how land is utilized, modified, and organized by people.

Local Scale vs Global Scale

Local scale refers to a local area (village, town, city), while global scale relates to the entire world.

Material Culture

A type of culture consisting of concrete/physical human creations.

Mobility

All types of movement between locations.

Natural resources

Items that occur in the natural environment that people can use, such as air, water, oil, fish, soil, and minerals.

Nonrenewable resources

Limited resources that can be exhausted by human users.

Place

A specific point on Earth distinguished by a particular characteristic.

Region

A group of places in the same area that share a characteristic.

Regionalization

The organization of the Earth's surface into distinct areas that are viewed as different from other areas.

Renewable resources

Unlimited natural resources that theoretically will not be depleted based on use by people.

Sense of place

The perception of the characteristics of places based on personal beliefs.

Site

The physical characteristic of a place.

Situation

The location of a place relative to another place.

Spatial association

Matching patterns of distribution.

Sustainability

The overarching theme of human geography related to using resources now in ways that allow their future use while minimizing negative environmental impacts.

Time space compression

The shrinking time distance or relative distance between locations due to improved methods of transportation and communication.

Toponym

The name given to a place on Earth, often derived from founders, religious affiliation, physical features, or colonial origins.

Absolute Location (*w)

a place may be located by mathematically calculating its location using latitude and longitude

Aerial Photography (drive vocab list)

remotely sensed information captured from planes and from satellites that orbit the earth above the atmosphere.

Cartography

The science of map making.

Centralized Pattern (*w)

distribution pattern is if objects circle another object

Distortion

On a map or image, the misrepresentation of shape, area, distance, or direction of or between geographic features when compared to their true measurements on the curved surface of the earth.

Fieldwork (*amsco)

data observed and recorded on location

Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

a computer system that stores, organizes, analyzes, and displays geographic data

Geospatial data

data that is specific to one location, can be quantitative or qualitative

Global Positioning Systems (GPS)

a system that determines the precise position of something on Earth through a series of satellites, tracking stations, and receivers

Globalization

actions or processes that involve the entire world and result in making something worldwide in scope

Greenwich Mean Time

the time in the zone encompassing the prime meridian, or 0 degrees longitude

International Date Line

an arc that for the most part follows 180 degrees longitude, although it deviates in several places to avoid dividing land areas

Isoline map

map displaying lines that connect points of equal value such as a map showing elevation (topographic)

Land use

study of how land is utilized, modified and organized by people

Landscapes (*w)

the overall appearance of an area that is shaped by both human and natural influences

Linear Pattern (*w)

distribution pattern is along straight lines

Location

the position of anything on Earth's surface

Map Projection

A mathematical method that involves transferring the earth's sphere onto a flat surface. This often causes the map to become distorted to some aspect of reality.

Map Scale

The relationship between the size of an object on a map and the size of the actual feature on Earth's surface.

Mercator Projection

A true conformal cylindrical map projection, it is particularly useful for navigation because it maintains accurate direction.

Population pyramid

a bar graph that represents the distribution of population by age and sex

Qualitative Geographic Data (*amsco)

collected as interviews, document archives, descriptions, and visual observations

Quantitative Geographic Data (*amsco)

information that can be measured and recorded using numbers

Random Pattern (*w)

no regular distribution can be seen

Rectilinear Pattern (*w)

a rectangular system of land survey adopted in much of the country under the Ordinance of 1785

Reference map

a map that emphasizes the location of places such as political, physical, road and plot maps.

Relative Location (*w)

defines a place in terms of how central or isolated it is in relation to other places

Remote sensing

the acquisition of data about Earth's surface from a satellite orbiting the planet or from other long-distance methods like aircrafts/planes

Robinson Projection

A map projection that attempts to balance several possible projection errors. It does attempt to minimize the errors of area, shape, distance or direction that are commonly found on all maps.

Satellite Imagery (Google)

images of the Earth collected by satellite

Scale

The relationship between the portion of Earth being studied and Earth as a whole. It is a ratio between the size of something in the real world to the size of that something on a map.

Space

the physical gap or interval between two objects

Spatial data

information that can be tied to specific locations.

Spatial Organization (*w)

the location of places, people, and events and the connections among places and landscapes

Stimulus

a graph, chart, map or photograph image which are often analyzed on a multiple choice question or free response question.

Thematic map

map that displays not only locations but also a topic or theme of information with the location.