Which way do we go?: mental representations of navigational directions

Abstract

Two experiments investigated the influence of different types of determinacy and perspective on the representation of spatial information. In both experiments, subjects learned one of these three types of directions from either a survey or route perspective. Indeterminate directions contain locative information that is incomplete. Determinate directions contain complete locative information. Overdeterminate directions provide complete locative information, plus additional spatial text. In the first experiment, subjects memorized one of six direction texts of either a Detroit-based or Pittsburgh-based environment. Then, subjects free recalled the text from memory, verified test statements, and completed a wayfinding task using a map. Subjects who learned overdeterminate texts spent more time studying, made more wayfinding errors, and recorded fewer ideas than the indeterminate and determinate subjects. Individuals studying from a survey perspective drew more maps during the free recall and recorded fewer locative ideas than those studying route. In the second experiment, subjects listened to tape recordings of one of these six directions of the Pittsburgh-based environment. While listening to the directions, subjects recorded notes. A week later, subjects used their notes to aid them in tracing the described route on a map. Individuals listening to overdeterminate directions spent more time tracing a route, made more wayfinding errors, recorded more verbatim ideas, and recorded more total ideas than subjects in the other two groups. Subjects who listened to a survey perspective made more wayfinding errors, recorded more gist ideas, and drew more maps during note taking than those who listened to a route. Results from both experiments support research showing that individuals receiving complex spatial information experience difficulty forming a situation representation of the text (Naveh-Benjamin, 1987; Talbot, Kaplan, Kuo, & Kaplan, 1993). Since wayfinding is a route based goal, those studying from a route perspective had an easier time developing a situation representation than survey subjects. These results support predictions that individuals perform best when the perspective studied matches the goal (Gauvain & Rogoff, 1986; Millis & Cohen, 1994; Taylor & Naylor, 1995).