The aim of the thesis is to analyse the influence of cartographic style on the perception of road map. Two eye-tracking experiments and questionnaire survey achieved the objective in order to ascertain user perception of roadmaps. The research deals with cartographic style and its aspects, map perception and analysis of road maps from Kartografie PRAHA, a. s.
The subjects of the first eye-tracking experiment are two road atlases published by Kartografie PRAHA, a. s. in 1994 and 2013 which represent two different cartographic styles. There is the hypothesis that older road atlas is better legible than the new one. Statistically significant differences in the perception of two road maps were ascertained during the route search and elements search in the first experiment. Higher values of observed eye-tracking metrics (time to response and fixation count) were detected in the maps issued in 2013. There were proposed some changes (the color adjustment of the forest and communications) on the base of the first experiment in order to assess the influence of these aspects of cartographic style on the perception of road map and evaluate their effectiveness. The changes were adjusted in cooperation with the publisher Kartografie PRAHA, a. s. It was carried out that there is a significant influence of the colour of communications on road map perception during the route search.
Finally the results of two eye-tracking experiments and questionnaire survey were summarized in a set of general recommendations in order to increase road map efficiency and clarity.