Wayfinding: A simple concept, a complex process

Abstract

Wayfinding is the process of finding your way to a destination in a familiar or unfamiliar setting using any cues given by the environment. Due to its ubiquity in everyday life, wayfinding appears on the surface to be a simply characterized and understood process; however, this very ubiquity and the resulting need to refine and optimize wayfinding has led to a great number of studies that have revealed that it is in fact a deeply complex exercise. In this article, we examine the motivations for investigating wayfinding, with particular attention being paid to the unique challenges faced in transportation hubs, and discuss the associated principles and factors involved as they have been perceived from different research perspectives. We also review the approaches used to date in the modelling of wayfinding in various contexts. We attempt to draw together the different perspectives applied to wayfinding and postulate the importance of wayfinding and the need to understand this seemingly simple, but concurrently complex, process.

Acknowledgements

This research forms part of the work undertaken by the project Airports of the Future (LP0990135) which is funded by the Australian Research Council Linkage project scheme. The authors also acknowledge the contributions made by the many aviation industry stakeholders involved in this project. More details on Airports of the Future and its participants can be found at www.airportsofthefuture.qut.edu.au. The authors are grateful to the Reviewers for their feedback on this manuscript. The first author acknowledges the feedback obtained from A/Professor Dann Mallet and Dr Daniel Simpson during earlier versions of this manuscript.