Forloines Martha R, Bodily Kent D, Sturz Bradley R
Department of Psychology, Auburn University , Auburn, AL, USA.
Department of Psychology, Georgia Southern University , Statesboro, GA, USA.
Front Psychol. 2015 Apr 28;6:488. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00488. eCollection 2015.
One approach to explaining the conditions under which additional landmarks will be learned or ignored relates to the nature of the information provided by the landmarks (i.e., distance versus bearings). In the current experiment, we tested the ability of such an approach to explain the search behavior of human participants in a virtual landmark-based navigation task by manipulating whether landmarks provided stable distance, stable direction, or both stable distance and stable direction information. First, we incrementally shaped human participants' search behavior in the presence of two ambiguous landmarks. Next, participants experienced one additional landmark that disambiguated the location of the goal. Finally, we presented three additional landmarks. In a control condition, the additional landmarks maintained stable distances and bearings to the goal across trials. In a stable bearings condition, the additional landmarks varied in their distances but maintained fixed bearings to the goal across trials. In a stable distance condition, the additional landmarks varied in their bearings but maintained fixed distances to the goal across trials. Landmark stability, in particular, the stability of landmark-to-goal bearings, affected learning of the added landmarks. We interpret the results in the context of the theories of spatial learning that incorporate the nature of the information provided by landmarks.
一种解释在何种条件下额外的地标会被学习或忽略的方法，与地标所提供信息的性质有关（即距离与方位）。在当前实验中，我们通过操控地标是提供稳定距离、稳定方向还是同时提供稳定距离和稳定方向信息，来测试这种方法解释人类参与者在基于地标的虚拟导航任务中搜索行为的能力。首先，在存在两个模糊地标时，我们逐步塑造人类参与者的搜索行为。接下来，参与者体验到一个额外的地标，该地标消除了目标位置的歧义。最后，我们呈现了另外三个地标。在一个控制条件下，额外的地标在各次试验中与目标保持稳定的距离和方位。在稳定方位条件下，额外的地标距离有所变化，但在各次试验中与目标保持固定的方位。在稳定距离条件下，额外的地标方位有所变化，但在各次试验中与目标保持固定的距离。地标稳定性，尤其是地标到目标方位的稳定性，影响了新增地标的学习。我们在纳入地标所提供信息性质的空间学习理论背景下解释这些结果。
