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Individual Differences In Cognitive Map Accuracy: Investigating The Role Of Landmark Familiarity, Nicole L. Youngson, Megan Vollebregt, Jennifer Sutton

Brescia School of Behavioural & Social Sciences Publications

Broad individual differences exist in the ability to create a cognitive map of a new environment. The current studies investigated whether familiarizing participants with to-be-learned target landmarks (Experiment 1) or target landmarks plus the order they would be encountered along routes (Experiment 2) before exploring the Silcton virtual environment would increase performance on tasks assaying spatial memory of Silcton. Participants in both experiments were randomly assigned to be pre-exposed either to information about target landmarks in Silcton or control landmarks on the university campus. In both experiments, participants explored Silcton via four prescribed routes and then performed a direction estimation …