Spatial Exploration Patterns And Navigation Efficiency

1
Introduction Experimental investigation of
navigation patterns is rare in human spatial
research. Previous studies have tried to describe
the possible functions of goal-directed
exploratory behaviour in people with visual
impairments (e.g., Gaunet Thinus-Blanc, 1996).
They concluded that systematic patterns occur in
navigation and these are correlated with the
actual performance. More recently, trajectory
patterns of sighted participants were also
identified in virtual environments (Kallai,
Makany, Karadi, Jacobs, 2005 Sas, OHare,
Reilly, 2003). These studies found that
frequently occurring trajectories are good
predictors of navigation performance and they
appear in different phases of spatial
learning. The present study aimed to analyse
exploratory route patterns and strategies of
sighted navigators in an indoor, real-world
environment, and relate them to spatial
efficiency. Hypothesis Our first hypothesis was
that we will find systematic patterns in the
initial explorations of the novel space. These
patterns reflect the preferred sequences of
object exploration and the utilization strategies
of the available spatial information. The
second hypothesis was that exploratory patterns
determine efficiency in subsequent navigation
tasks. The more distributed, repetitive, and
systematic strategies of exploration will result
in a better representation of the space, which
leads to higher efficiency in complex navigation
tasks.

• Spatial Exploration Patterns And Navigation
  Efficiency

Tamas Makany, Edward Redhead, Itiel E.
Dror School of Psychology, University of
Southampton Highfield Campus, Southampton, SO17
1BJ, United Kingdom Email tm304_at_soton.ac.uk
Conclusions Based on our results, we argue that
search patterns reflect different strategies of
spatial information acquisition and
representation that determined subsequent
navigation performance. Axial explorers were
using more central reference for advancing,
without expanding their search area (Figure 1).
They remained anchored to the centre of the
space, which served as a base for further
set-offs. Participants with the circular
pattern spread out to the more peripheral regions
of the space (Figure 2). Objects were explored on
a relative radius around the centre in a
sequential order. In complex navigation tasks
(Phase 3), axial explorers utilized less
flexibly their spatial knowledge as navigators
with circular patterns. Acknowledgement Tamas
Makany was funded by the School Scholarship
Award, School of Psychology, University of
Southampton, UK. References Gaunet, F.
Thinus-Blanc, C. (1996). Early blind subjects
spatial abilities in the locomotor space
Exploratory strategies and reaction-to-change.
Perception, 25, 967-981. Kallai, J., Makany, T.,
Karadi, K., Jacobs, W. J. (2005). Spatial
orientation strategies in Morris-type virtual
water task for humans. Behavioural Brain
Research, 159, 187-196. Sas, C., OHare, G.,
Reilly R. (2003). Online trajectory
classification. In B. Ganter and A. de Moor
(Eds.), International Conference on Computational
Science Lecture Notes in Computer Science 2659
(pp. 1035-1044). Berlin Springer-Verlag.

• Method
• Participants
• 41 student volunteers (24 female, 17 male)
• M 29.81 yrs, SD 9.23, Range 18-50
• 2 excluded 1 video error, 1 unclassifiable
• Materials
• 3.5 x 3.5 meters sized squared space
• large black curtains on each wall
• five identical opened boxes were arranged
• on the floor containing different objects
• video recorder on the ceiling for tracking
• Procedure
• Phase 1 free exploration for 1-minute.
• Phase 2 simple navigations between
• objects in a predefined order.
• Phase 3 three navigation tasks between
• three objects in any optional order.

Figure 1. Superimposed summary of the Axial
exploratory path patterns from a bird-eye view
perspective. Objects within the room are shown
with an X.
Figure 2. Superimposed summary of the Circular
exploratory path patterns from a bird-eye view
perspective. Objects within the room are shown
with an X.
Figure 3. Mean navigation route lengths for axial
(n 11) and circular (n 28) initial
exploratory pattern groups.