title: Some evidence of a female advantage in object location memory using ecologically valid stimuli.
abstract: A female advantage in object recall is assumed to derive from an adaptation to gathering/foraging. Support for the Gathering Hypothesis has relied upon stimuli and methodologies that lack ecological validity. We report two studies in which object recognition and object location memory were addressed using real plants within naturalistic arrays. In the first, females were significantly quicker than males at finding specific plants in some small arrays, and they made significantly fewer mistakes in a larger array. Next, females also located plants in a large and complex array significantly faster than males. We thus find some support for the Gathering Hypothesis using ecologically valid methods.
authors.affiliation: Human Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology and Sport Sciences, Northumberland Building, Northumbria University, NE1 8ST, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. nick.neave@northumbria.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Nick
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Neave
authors.affiliation: Human Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology and Sport Sciences, Northumberland Building, Northumbria University, NE1 8ST, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
authors.forename: Colin
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Hamilton
authors.affiliation: Human Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology and Sport Sciences, Northumberland Building, Northumbria University, NE1 8ST, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
authors.forename: Lee
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Hutton
authors.affiliation: Human Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, School of Psychology and Sport Sciences, Northumberland Building, Northumbria University, NE1 8ST, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
authors.forename: Nicola
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Tildesley
authors.affiliation: University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
authors.forename: Anne T
authors.initials: AT
authors.lastname: Pickering
keywords: Division of labor model; Gathering hypothesis; Location memory; Object memory; Sex differences; Spatial memory