Similarities of Adult Cognitive Perception on a Gender Basis

Urban space perception is the first step in communicating with the environment, and this knowledge creates the mental image and, as a result, a person’s cognitive map of the space. This is significantly impacted by the gender, age, and familiarity of a person with the environment. Therefore, women and men have different cognitive maps of the environment that are affected by their different perceptions. Perception involves the process of obtaining information from the environment, and has a purposeful and systematic structure to answer our responses to the environment. Cognitive maps are formed in relation to individual and environmental characteristics, so that each person receives information from the environment, encodes, stores and restores them in a different way. Desirable urban spaces should have the ability to be perceptible and memorable.The function of other mental maps is to induce and express clear meanings because people in the city create different meaning and sense urban phenomena by distinction between different sensory effects. The city is a complex arena of perception and memory, but the meaning of the urban space is limited to individual and cultural memories. Nasar believes that there are three types of environmental perception theory for urban design. The first is the theory of the level of compatibility, which suggests that people adapt themselves to the prevailing levels of dominance. The second theory is ecological approach to perception, which considers the environment to be a meaningful structure and stimulus. The active observer will identify the environment structures and provide a basis for their search. Here, the concept of environmental capability plays an important role. We perceive the nature and levels of collections and objects first by examining their appropriateness. The third theory is probabilistic functionality that believes that human assessment is shaped in an environment with probabilities that depend on people’s perceptions of physical clues, which is also dependent on probabilities that are always accompanied by the physical characteristics of the environment.The purpose of this paper is to identify the similarities of cognitive perception in relation with gender. In general, the qualitative-analytical methods have been used frequently. In order to collect theoretical foundations, the methodology of observation and field observation has been used to assess the status quo and the questionnaire tool and cognitive map technique have been used to collect the research data. The target group of the study consists of 15 to 64 year-old men and women, and the sample size is 132 random samples with Cochran formula. To analyze the data and deduce the findings of the research, the statistical-qualitative method was used to analyze the questionnaires and the Cognitive Technique of mapping was used to deduce perceptual similarities.The findings of the research show that the conceptual framework of men and women from space is formed based on signs, paths, nodes, and the edges and that the ranges do not play an effective role in the mental image of individuals. Also, different age intervals are two by two are similar to each other in perceptions, but in the age of 15-28, the perceptions of the edges are distinct from others. It should be noted that the perception of qualities such as confinement, differentiation and diversity are similar between the two genders. In contrast, the perception of the environment at an all-time interval age is different. Also, 88% of men and 86% of women have plotted their cognitive patterns in a sequential pattern. Spatial geometry with different age ranges indicates that 22 percent of people aged between 15 to 64 perceive and draw the environment based on spatial patterns.The physical age of the sign element, along with being fit with daily needs, has a significant impact on creating a mental image for adults, especially women aged 15 to 28. The distinction of the sign in terms of physical and elevation aspects, is more important in marking for the men of the same age. The gender factor has not only influenced perceptual similarity about confinement, and in some cases such as sign distinction, node differentiation, edge resolution, orientation, and, to a degree, variation of the range in different age intervals has created a perceptual difference. The sign element plays a significant role in the perceptual similarities between men and women of different ages, and the dating of time and physical distinction are among the factors influencing the marking of the element of sign in the image of the element of sign in the adult mental image. Also, considering the sequences in the cognitive maps, we can say that the spatial geometry of the environment in the adult mind is based on the element of the node and the path together with the placement of the indicator elements.