Perspective, Instruction, and Cognitive Style in Spatial Representation of a Virtual Environment

An environment can be experienced by moving around in it, inspecting it from above, studying a map, or listening to a verbal description. How does learning from different spatial perspectives together with instructions to focus on particular aspects of an environment, affect one’s cognitive map? Fifty-four undergraduates (30 females, 24 males) learned a route through an urban virtual environment from either a map (survey perspective) or from virtual navigation (route perspective), with instructions to focus either on landmarks or on intersections. The survey group learned the environment by watching a dot moving through a map, whereas the route group learned by watching a virtual person walking through the virtual environment.While learning, participants were stopped at critical points and instructions focused their attention on either land- marks or intersections. After learning, all participants performed several spatial tasks: navigation, map drawing, and pointing. Individual differences in the cognitive style of spatial representation were assessed. Results showed that spatial perspective and individual differences in spatial representations interacted to affect performance.