Date of Award

2013

Degree Type

Thesis

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Yamamoto, Naohide

Subject Headings

Learning, Psychology of, Space perception, Spatial behavior, Spatial ability

Abstract

Spatial cognition often requires the contemplation of multiple discrete layouts. Determining the relative direction of objects between distinct layouts comes with a cost to accuracy when compared to determining the relative direction among objects from within the same layout. The decrease in accuracy that results from comparing discrete layouts is called integration cost (Yamamoto & Shelton, 2008). Yamamoto (2007) found that the cost of integration between two layouts learned through the same modality is equivalent to the cost of integrating between two layouts learned through different modalities (i.e., vision and proprioception). Yamamoto's findings suggest that modulating the learning modalities of layouts does not affect the cost of integrating those layouts. According to the amodal theory of spatial cognition, spatial representations are not dependent upon learning modality. Yamamoto's findings are consistent with the amodal theory. However, it is important to know whether this equivalence is unique to the relationship between vision and proprioception, the modalities used by Yamamoto, or whether it is observable between other modalities as well. The proposed experiment is therefore designed to investigate the relationship between vision and haptics as it relates to integration cost. The hypothesis is that integration cost will occur equally within and between modalities. If this is the case, then it will provide further support for the theory of amodal spatial representation. Such a result would show that the spatial information used to integrate spatial representations in long-term memory is not dependent upon encoding modality

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