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Neither by global nor local cues alone: evidence for a unified orientation process

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Abstract

A substantial amount of empirical and theoretical debate remains concerning the extent to which an ability to orient with respect to the environment is determined by global (i.e., principal axis of space), local (i.e., wall lengths, angles), and/or view-based (i.e., stored representation) accounts. We developed an orientation task that allowed the manipulation of the reliability of the principal axis of space (i.e., searching at the egocentric left- and/or right-hand side of the principal axis) between groups while maintaining goal distance from the principal axis, local cues specifying the goal location (i.e., short wall left, short wall right, and obtuse angle), and visual aspects of the goal location consistent across groups. Control and test trials revealed that participants trained with a reliable principal axis of space utilized both global and local geometric cues, whereas those trained with an unreliable principal axis of space utilized only local geometric cues. Results suggest that both global and local geometric cues are utilized for reorientation and that the reliability of the principal axis of an enclosure differentially influences the use of geometric cues. Such results have implications for purely global-based, purely local-based, and purely view-based matching theoretical accounts of geometry learning and provide evidence for a unified orientation process.

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Acknowledgments

This research was conducted following the relevant ethical guidelines for human research and supported by a National Science Foundation Science and Technology Expansion Program (NSF-STEP DUE-0856593) Grant to the College of Science and Technology at AASU and an AASU Summer Research Grant to BRS. We thank Kate Gaskin, April Graves, and Taylor Gurley for assistance with data collection, scoring, and editorial comments. We are grateful to three anonymous reviewers for comments on an earlier version of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Georgia Southern University, P. O. Box 8041, Statesboro, GA, 30460, USA

    Kent D. Bodily

  2. Department of Psychology, Armstrong Atlantic State University, 229 Science Center, 11935 Abercorn Street, Savannah, GA, 31419, USA

    Caroline K. Eastman & Bradley R. Sturz

Authors
  1. Kent D. Bodily
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  2. Caroline K. Eastman
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  3. Bradley R. Sturz
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Correspondence to Bradley R. Sturz.

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Please note that first and third authors contributed equally to this project.

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Bodily, K.D., Eastman, C.K. & Sturz, B.R. Neither by global nor local cues alone: evidence for a unified orientation process. Anim Cogn 14, 665–674 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-011-0401-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-011-0401-x

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