Cognitive and gender factors influencing navigation in a virtual environment

✍ Scribed by TIM R.H. CUTMORE; TREVOR J. HINE; KERRY J. MABERLY; NICOLE M. LANGFORD; GRANT HAWGOOD

• Book ID: 102571064
• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2000
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 277 KB
• Volume: 53
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1071-5819
• DOI: 10.1006/ijhc.2000.0389

✦ Synopsis

Virtual environments (VEs) are becoming popular as media for training, modelling and entertainment. Little is known, however, about the factors that a!ect e$cient and rapid acquisition of knowledge using this technology. Five experiments examined the in#uence of gender, passive/active navigation, cognitive style, hemispheric activation measured by electroencephalography and display information on the acquisition of two types of navigational knowledge using a VE: route and survey knowledge. Males acquired route knowledge from landmarks faster than females. In situations where survey knowledge must be used, pro"ciency in visual-spatial cognition is associated with better performance. The right cerebral hemisphere appears to be more activated than the left during navigational learning in a VE. In identifying cognitive factors that in#uence VE navigation, these results have a number of implications in the use of VEs for training purposes and may assist in linking processes involved in navigation to a more general framework of visual-spatial processing and mental imagery.