Breaking Down the Development of Allocentric Reasoning: Relative to one cue or many

• In Event: 2-083 - How do navigational skills develop in typical and atypical populations?

Integrative Statement

In the study of spatial cognition, we typically divide egocentric (self-based) reasoning from allocentric (world-based) reasoning. Here we further divide allocentric reasoning into two types: a memory of where something was relative only to a single nearby salient landmark (single-cue allocentric) and relative to a number of different coordinated landmarks at the same time (multi-cue allocentric). The latter involves a deeper sense of spatial reasoning as it places the landmarks into a represented spatial relation between each other – something like a ‘cognitive map’. Is this a valid theoretical distinction in the study of early spatial cognition? In other words, is allocentric reasoning fundamentally multi-cue from first emergence, or does the multi-cue aspect lag in development?
We hypothesized that multi-cue allocentric reasoning would be more difficult and appear later, in line with the pattern suggested by Piaget (1965), but earlier than that text suggested.
Participants were 68 typically developing children from 3.5-5.5 years old. Participants were placed in a virtual environment with two symmetric landmarks. This allows us to assess single-cue and multi-cue allocentric recall separately. Coding locations relative to just one landmark should lead to predictable errors whereby the response is given at a point mirrored across the landmark’s lines of symmetry. Participants were shown a target, a penguin named Steve. Steve buried himself underground. The participants then were ‘teleported’: the screen faded to black, the camera moved to a new viewpoint, and the screen faded back in. Participants then attempted to point where Steve was hiding with a motion-tracked ‘magic wand’.
We found that multi-cue allocentric reasoning was more difficult, and that it improved slower with age, but did not find a separate age of emergence. The younger year pointed to the correct landmark 77% of the time, then the older year 88%. However, the proportion of these responses disambiguating the symmetry of each landmark by using the other one stayed at 57%. This was significant (p=.006 and p=.001) for both years. Further, this was not due to responses simply becoming closer to the correct location in a general way, as symmetric mirroring errors were more likely than orthogonal spatial errors, chi-square(1) = 18.13, p < .001. As expected, these ages of first emergence are much younger than Piaget’s suggestions.
These results overall suggest that this distinction is relevant as a way of theorizing about spatial cognitive development. While it is not clear that single-cue allocentric reasoning emerges earlier, it is clear that multi-cue reasoning is harder and develops slower. This finding highlights the need for further resources in terms of assessment/intervention for children to develop their full spatial skills through to middle childhood.

Authors

• James Negen, University of Durham
  Presenting Author

• Linda Bou-Ali, American University of Beirut
  Non-Presenting Author

• Brittney Chere, Birkbeck, University of London
  Non-Presenting Author

• Marko Nardini, University of Durham
  Non-Presenting Author