More often than not, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) excludes emotion and qualitative analysis from studies of people-place relationships in favor of quantitative approaches. We employ emotional cartography as a form of qualitative GIS (qualGIS) to elevate emotions from the periphery to the center of dialogue about children's well-being. We highlight the ontological parallels between qualGIS, emotional cartography and children in society, and advance emotion maps as a way to visualize different spatial and emotional realities. In reflecting upon the felt geography of our own childhood places, we affirm the importance of children's emotional attachments to places as well as the centrality of ‘messy’ human experiences in GIS. To conclude, we discuss the implications of emotional cartography for researchers, planners and GIS, paying special attention to children's well-being amidst the current COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, this includes a call to ‘witness’ and to foster spatial empathy among those advocating for children.

地理信息系统（GIS）经常从人与地关系的研究中排除情感和定性分析，而采用定量方法。我们将情感地图学作为定性GIS（qualGIS）的一种形式，将情感从周边提升到有关儿童福祉的对话中心。我们重点介绍了QualGIS，情感制图学和社会上的儿童之间的本体论相似性，并提出了情感图，以可视化不同的空间和情感现实。在反思自己童年时期的感觉地理时，我们确认了儿童对场所的情感依恋以及在GIS中“凌乱”的人类体验的重要性的重要性。最后，我们讨论了情感地图学对研究人员，计划人员和GIS的影响，在当前的COVID-19大流行中，要特别关注儿童的福祉。特别是，这包括呼吁“证人”并在倡导儿童的人中促进空间同理。