title: Spatial learning while navigating with severely degraded viewing: The role of attention and mobility monitoring.
abstract: The ability to navigate without getting lost is an important aspect of quality of life. In 5 studies, we evaluated how spatial learning is affected by the increased demands of keeping oneself safe while walking with degraded vision (mobility monitoring). We proposed that safe low vision mobility requires attentional resources, providing competition for those needed to learn a new environment. In Experiments 1 and 2, participants navigated along paths in a real-world indoor environment with simulated degraded vision or normal vision. Memory for object locations seen along the paths was better with normal compared with degraded vision. With degraded vision, memory was better when participants were guided by an experimenter (low monitoring demands) versus unguided (high monitoring demands). In Experiments 3 and 4, participants walked while performing an auditory task. Auditory task performance was superior with normal compared with degraded vision. With degraded vision, auditory task performance was better when guided compared with unguided. In Experiment 5, participants performed both the spatial learning and auditory tasks under degraded vision. Results showed that attention mediates the relationship between mobility-monitoring demands and spatial learning. These studies suggest that more attention is required and spatial learning is impaired when navigating with degraded viewing.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Utah.
authors.forename: Kristina M
authors.initials: KM
authors.lastname: Rand
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Utah.
authors.forename: Sarah H
authors.initials: SH
authors.lastname: Creem-Regehr
authors.affiliation: School of Computing, University of Utah.
authors.forename: William B
authors.initials: WB
authors.lastname: Thompson
mesh_terms: D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology; D001288:Attention; D001307:Auditory Perception; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011930:Reaction Time; D065853:Spatial Learning; D065852:Spatial Memory; D065854:Spatial Navigation; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D014796:Visual Perception