Skip to main content

Citation

Rindfuss, Ronald R.; Walsh, Stephen J.; Turner, Billie L., II; Fox, Jefferson; & Mishra, Vinod (2004). Developing a Science of Land Change: Challenges and Methodological Issues. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 101(39), 13976-13981. PMCID: PMC521107

Abstract

Land-change science has emerged as a foundational element of global environment change and sustainability science. It seeks to understand the human and environment dynamics that give rise to changed land uses and covers, not only in terms of their type and magnitude but their location as well. This focus requires the integration of social, natural, and geographical information sciences. Each of these broad research communities has developed different ways to enter the land-change problem, each with different means of treating the locational specificity of the critical variables, such as linking the land manager to the parcel being managed. The resulting integration encounters various data, methodological, and analytical problems, especially those concerning aggregation and inference, land-use pixel links, data and measurement, and remote sensing analysis. Here, these integration problems, which hinder comprehensive understanding and theory development, are addressed. Their recognition and resolution are required for the sustained development of land-change science.

URL

http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0401545101

Reference Type

Journal Article

Year Published

2004

Journal Title

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Author(s)

Rindfuss, Ronald R.
Walsh, Stephen J.
Turner, Billie L., II
Fox, Jefferson
Mishra, Vinod

PMCID

PMC521107

ORCiD

Walsh, S - 0000-0001-6274-9381