Human Circadian Rhythm Through the Lens of GIScience: A Systematic Review

Geographic Information Science (GIScience) offers promising data and tools to innovatively capture and analyze human circadian rhythms across space and time at unprecedented scales, yet its potential remains underexplored. This systematic investigation examines 60 studies published between 2001 and 2024 that applied GIScience to investigate circadian rhythm patterns and their associations with social-environmental factors. Most studies relied on survey or sensor-based data, with limited use of emerging sources such as social media, mobility, web applications, and remote sensing. We found that previous research largely emphasized individual- and population-level monitoring, particularly at the city scale with minute-level temporal resolutions. Traditional statistical approaches dominated, while spatial analysis and advanced spatial-temporal modeling techniques were rarely applied. Findings highlight that both geographic attributes (e.g., latitude, longitude, altitude) and social-environmental conditions (e.g., light, noise, socioeconomic status) exert spatially heterogeneous influences on circadian rhythms, underscoring the need for greater integration of GIScience data and methods into circadian research.