Does understanding basic relational language help children succeed on a spatial reorientation test?

• In Event: Poster Session 09
  In Poster Session: PS 09 Topic - Cognitive Processes

Abstract

We often use language to describe, represent, and understand the space around us, which helps us plan successful navigational strategies. Spatial language includes words that describe relations between objects or between the self and objects (e.g., across, below, around, near, left) as well as words that describe the features and properties of objects (e.g., big, tall, round) in space (Pruden, Levine, & Huttenlocher, 2011). We may talk about how things in the environment are related to each other using different systems of spatial localization, called frames of reference (Ishikawa, 2020). There are three kinds of spatial frames of reference: intrinsic (e.g., they are standing in front of the house), relative (e.g., they are standing to the left of the house), and absolute (e.g., they are standing north of the house). For the current study, we focus on intrinsic and relative concepts because they develop earlier than absolute frames of reference and are, thus, easier for young children to understand. Previous studies have assessed children’s comprehension and production of spatial words in relation to their small-scale spatial abilities like mental rotation (e.g., Pruden et al., 2011), but there is a paucity of data on the associations between children’s knowledge of spatial language and their large-scale spatial skills (i.e., navigation, reorientation). Since language shapes the way we think and talk about the world, this study tested children’s knowledge of basic relational (e.g., nearest, across) and directional (e.g., left and right) words in relation to their choices on a spatial reorientation test.
Thirty-nine 4-6-year-old children (19 Female) completed a spatial reorientation test (e.g., Vieites et al., 2020), a left-right assessment, the Boehm-3 Preschool Test of Basic Concepts (Boehm, 2001), and two control tasks, the Children’s Mental Transformation Task (CMTT; Ehrlich et al., 2006) and the NIH Toolbox Pattern Comparison Processing Speed (PCPS) Test (Carlozzi et al., 2015).
When excluding outliers and controlling for age, CMTT scores, and PCPS scores, multiple regression analyses revealed that children who knew right from left were better at encoding the geometry (i.e., shape) of a room when solving a spatial reorientation task (B=.088; p=.044). Children’s performance on the Boehm-3, however, did not predict geometry use on the spatial reorientation test, controlling for age and the two control tasks (B=-.104; p=.729). These findings suggest that, independent of age, children’s understanding of specific spatial concepts (i.e., left and right) as opposed to relational language more broadly, as measured by the Boehm-3, may help them use the geometric properties of space to narrow down their choices when searching for target locations after being disoriented (i.e., lost).
Overall, these findings may offer insights into the associations between understanding relative frames of reference and the strategies young children use to find their bearings, suggesting that psychological constructs like language may affect spatial cognition in early childhood. Thus, parents and teachers may want to engage in talk about basic directions with children at earlier ages, teaching them the difference between left and right in preschool rather than, more commonly, in early elementary school.

Authors

• Vanessa Vieites, Florida International University
  Presenting Author

• Bethany Catherine Reeb-Sutherland, Florida International University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Aaron Mattfeld, Florida International University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Anthony Steven Dick, Florida International University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Timothy Hayes, Florida International University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Shannon Marie Pruden, Florida International University
  Non-Presenting Author