Abstract
For the identifying of spatial distribution pattern, Moran's Index(I) which has the range of values from -1 to +1 is common method for the spatial autocorrelation measurement. When I is close to 1, all neighboring features have close to the same value, indicating clustered pattern. Conversely, if the spatial pattern is dispersed, I is close to -1. And I closing to 0 means spatially random pattern. However, this index equation is influenced by how defining the neighboring features for target feature. To compare and understand the difference of neighborhood definition methods, fixed distance neighboring method and Gabriel Network method were used for I. In this study, these two methods were applied to two marine environments with water quality data. One is Gwangyang Bay which has complex geometric coastal structure located in South Sea of Korea. Another is Uljin area adjacent to open sea located in east coast of Korea. The distances between water quality observed locations were relatively regular in Gwangyang Bay, however, irregular in Uljin area. And for the fixed distance method popular Arc GIS tool was used, but, for the Gabriel Network, Visual Basic program was developed to produce Gabriel Network and calculate Moran's I and its Z-score automatically. According to this experimental results, different spatial pattern was showed differently for some data with using of neighboring definition methods. Therefore there is need to choose neighboring definition method carefully for spatial pattern analysis.
