Regeneration and children’s neighborhood knowledge: A cross-sectional cognitive mapping study in Istanbul

Abstract This article investigates whether and how 9–11-year-old children’s knowledge of the physical attributes of their neighborhood change from less to more redeveloped neighborhoods. Our findings are based on the cognitive map drawings of 274 children living in six historic Istanbul neighborhoods with varying degrees of redevelopment. The findings show that, compared to children in more redeveloped contexts, children living in neighborhoods that have managed to partly protect their historic fabric and land uses tend to draw more physical attributes of their neighborhoods. Compared to children in less redeveloped contexts, children in more redeveloped neighborhoods are less likely to show communal places commonly used for socialization, and more likely to show tourist-oriented places in and around their communities on their map drawings. A negative association was found between length of residency in the neighborhood and the number of nodes and districts drawn in the least redeveloped neighborhoods.