The authors investigated how humans use multiple landmarks to locate a goal. Participants searched for a hidden goal location along a line between 2 distinct landmarks on a computer screen. On baseline trials, the location of the landmarks and goal varied, but the distance between each of the landmarks and the goal was held constant, with 1…

Memories for spatial locations often show systematic errors toward the central value of the surrounding region. The Category Adjustment (CA) model suggests that this bias is due to a Bayesian combination of categorical and metric information, which offers an optimal solution under conditions of uncertainty (Huttenlocher, Hedges, & Duncan,…

Memory performance in linear order reasoning tasks (A > B, B > C, C > D, etc.) shows quicker, and more accurate responses to queries on wider (AD) than narrower (AB) pairs on a hypothetical linear mental model (A -- B -- C -- D). While indicative of an analogue representation, research so far did not provide positive evidence for spatial…

The question of how meaningful associations between verbal and spatial information might be utilized to facilitate working memory performance is potentially highly instructive for models of memory function. The present study explored how separable processing capacities within specialized domains might each contribute to this, by examining the…

There are marked individual differences in the formation of cognitive maps both in the real world and in virtual environments (VE; e.g., Blajenkova, Motes, & Kozhevnikov, 2005; Chai & Jacobs, 2010; Ishikawa & Montello, 2006; Wen, Ishikawa, & Sato, 2011). These differences, however, are poorly understood and can be difficult to…

We propose a neural dynamic model that specifies how low-level visual processes can be integrated with higher level cognition to achieve flexible spatial language behaviors. This model uses real-word visual input that is linked to relational spatial descriptions through a neural mechanism for reference frame transformations. We demonstrate that…

Mou, Zhao, and McNamara (2007) proposed the "intrinsic model of human spatial memory," which posits that a viewer's memory of an array of objects will exhibit a preferred direction that is aligned with an intrinsic axis of the array. They defined intrinsic axes as salient axes created in part by the physical (geometric) properties of the…

Printed words that have a transposed-letter (TL) neighbor (e.g., angel has the TL neighbor angle) have been shown to be more difficult to process, in a range of paradigms, than words that do not have a TL neighbor. However, eye movement evidence suggests that this processing difficulty may occur on only a subset of trials. To investigate this…

In order to gain insight into the nature of human spatial representations, the current study examined how those representations are affected by blind rotation. Evidence was sought on the possibility that whereas certain environmental aspects may be updated independently of one another, other aspects may be grouped (or chunked) together and updated…

Recent models in spatial cognition posit that distinct memory systems are responsible for maintaining transient and enduring spatial relations. The authors used perspective-taking performance to assess the presence of these enduring and transient spatial memories for locations encoded through verbal descriptions. Across 3 experiments, spatial…

Memories for spatial locations often show systematic errors toward the central value of the surrounding region. This bias has been explained using a Bayesian model in which fine-grained and categorical information are combined (Huttenlocher, Hedges, & Duncan, 1991). However, experiments testing this model have largely used locations contained in…

Recent studies have used spatial reorientation task paradigms to identify underlying cognitive mechanisms of navigation in children, adults, and a range of animal species. Despite broad interest in this task across disciplines, little is known about the brain bases of reorientation. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine neural…

Examinations of interference between visual and spatial materials in working memory have suggested domain- and process-based fractionations of visuo-spatial working memory. The present study examined the role of central time-based resource sharing in visuo-spatial working memory and assessed its role in obtained interference patterns. Visual and…

According to the time-based resource-sharing model (P. Barrouillet, S. Bernardin, & V. Camos, 2004), the cognitive load a given task involves is a function of the proportion of time during which it captures attention, thus impeding other attention-demanding processes. Accordingly, the present study demonstrates that the disruptive effect on…

Four experiments required participants to keep track of the locations of (i.e., update) 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, or 15 target objects after rotating. Across all conditions, updating was unaffected by set size. Although some traditional set size effects (i.e., a linear increase of latency with memory load) were observed under some conditions, these…