Defining motility: the uses, operationalisations and limits of a concept

IF 2.3 2区社会学 Q1 GEOGRAPHY

Mobilities Pub Date : 2025-09-03 DOI:10.1080/17450101.2024.2449515

Emérence Guitton , Laurent Eisenman , Caroline Guerin , Marc Potel , Alain Somat

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Abstract

The aim of this review is to examine the definition and use of the concept of motility. Based on published and unpublished literature in the humanities and social sciences to date, the PRISMA method has been used. The Google Scholar electronic database was consulted in French and English. This concept has been the subject of empirical research and theoretical criticism. Among the 60 references selected, the literature reveals changes in the definition of motility and criticisms of the scope and measurement of the concept. Motility corresponds to an entity’s ability to move from one place to another within a social and spatial space. It can be used to study motivations for travel and inequalities in mobility, depending on socio-demographic conditions and context. This concept is widely applied to qualitative studies, and less so to quantitative ones. Its definition has been enriched between 2002 and the present day. Its three-dimensional composition (access, skills, appropriation) remains the subject of consensus, although there are divergences between the theory and its operationalisation. Other questions about the link between mobility and motility remain unanswered. Finally, control plays a key role in motility, while influencing mobility choices and experiences with predictive potential for daily mobility.

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定义运动性：概念的使用、操作和限制

这篇综述的目的是检查运动概念的定义和使用。基于迄今为止在人文社会科学领域发表和未发表的文献，采用了PRISMA方法。以法文和英文咨询谷歌Scholar电子数据库。这一概念一直是实证研究和理论批评的主题。在选定的60篇参考文献中，文献揭示了运动性定义的变化以及对该概念的范围和测量的批评。运动性对应于实体在社交和空间空间中从一个地方移动到另一个地方的能力。根据社会人口条件和背景，它可用于研究旅行动机和流动性不平等。这个概念广泛应用于定性研究，而较少应用于定量研究。从2002年到现在，它的定义得到了丰富。它的三维构成（获取、技能、挪用）仍然是共识的主题，尽管在理论和操作之间存在分歧。关于移动性和运动性之间联系的其他问题仍然没有答案。最后，控制在运动中发挥关键作用，同时影响运动选择和体验，具有预测日常运动的潜力。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Mobilities Multiple-

CiteScore

5.40

自引率

17.90%

发文量

期刊介绍： Mobilities examines both the large-scale movements of people, objects, capital, and information across the world, as well as more local processes of daily transportation, movement through public and private spaces, and the travel of material things in everyday life. Recent developments in transportation and communications infrastructures, along with new social and cultural practices of mobility, present new challenges for the coordination and governance of mobilities and for the protection of mobility rights and access. This has elicited many new research methods and theories relevant for understanding the connections between diverse mobilities and immobilities.