Visualisations of thematic structures in science are increasingly used in sociological investigations. Applications include the elicitation of interview responses on scientific topics and the reconstruction of an interviewees cognitive career. In both cases, maps also support the data analysis by providing the analyst with an opportunity to triangulate or to interrogate interview responses on thematic relationships.
The aim of the STSM is to explore further the potential of maps in sociological investigations. The above-described uses are essentially micro-sociological in that they focus on the interviewee’ perception of thematic structures. The STSM shall contribute to the exploration of the use of maps for macro-micro links. Is it possible to use maps for positioning individuals in knowledge landscapes and studying their interactions with these landscapes? This would require collecting and suitably processing information that links individuals to structural properties of the maps (e.g. keywords or publications used to build maps).
The aim of the STSM is to create “knowledge signatures” and “perspective signatures” of actors (individuals and organisations) that enables positioning them on base maps representing scientific knowledge. Examples used will include ‘Avian Flu’ maps and bibliometric representations of researchers’ intellectual biographies. In the case of avian flu maps, the aim of the analysis is to create a background for understanding stakeholder perspectives on the problems surrounding avian flu. In the case of researchers’ intellectual biographies, the aim is to trace cognitive mobility in scientific communities.

Jochen Gläser visits Ismael Rafols at INSTITUTO DE GESTIÓN DE LA INNOVACIÓN
Y DEL CONOCIMIENTO [Ingenio], Valencia Spain.