Landmark-dependent Navigation Strategy Declines across the Human Life-Span: Evidence from Over 37,000 Participants

Humans show a remarkable capacity to navigate various environments using different navigation strategies, and we know that strategy changes across the life span. However, this observation has been based on studies of small sample sizes. To this end, we used a mobile app-based video game (Sea Hero Quest) to test virtual navigation strategies and memory performance within a distinct radial arm maze level in over 37,000 participants. Players were presented with 6 pathways (3 open and 3 closed) and were required to navigate to the 3 open pathways to collect a target. Next, all 6 pathways were made available and the player was required to visit the pathways that were previously unavailable. Both reference memory and working memory errors were calculated. Crucially, at the end of the level, the player was asked a multiple-choice question about how they found the targets (i.e., a counting-dependent strategy vs. a landmark-dependent strategy). As predicted from previous laboratory studies, we found the use of landmarks declined linearly with age. Those using landmark-based strategies also performed better on reference memory than those using a counting-based strategy. These results extend previous observations in the laboratory showing a decreased use of landmark-dependent strategies with age

Cognitive mapping style relates to posterior-anterior hippocampal volume ratio

As London taxi drivers acquire ‘the knowledge’ and develop a detailed cognitive map of London, their posterior hippocampi (pHPC) gradually increase in volume, reflecting an increasing pHPC/aHPC volume ratio. In the mnemonic domain, greater pHPC/aHPC volume ratios in young adults have been found to relate to better recollection ability, indicating that the balance between pHPC and aHPC volumes might be reflective of cross-domain individual differences. Here, we examined participants’ self-reported use of cognitive map-based navigational strategies in relation to their pHPC/aHPC hippocampal volume ratio. We find that greater reported cognitive map use was related to significantly greater posterior, relative to anterior, hippocampal volume in two separate samples of young adults. Further, greater reported cognitive map usage correlated with better performance on a self-initiated navigation task. Together, these data help to advance our understanding of differences between aHPC and pHPC and the greater role of pHPC in spatial mapping

How memories facilitate perception in the human brain

thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Oxford Approximate Word Count: 50,000 After literary scholars, the group of people who most likely cite Marcel Proust are the niche group of psychologists and neuroscientists researching the topic of memory. The incident of the madeleine and Proust's vibrant re-experiencing of 'times past' highlights how important contextual associations are in our lives. The memories we form are often rich in contextual detail, and it is this type of memory which I aim to explore in this thesis. Specifically, I show how memories of contextual nature are formed, and used to guide behaviour. In the General Introduction (Chapter 1), I review the background literature of attention, and the different sources of information that guide it, as well as how contextual information -the associations between iterns-, specifically in natural scenes, can serve as such a source. Next, I describe in detail the literature to date on memory-based signals for attentional guidance. The next chapter summarizes the methodological approaches used in this thesis (Chapter 2). In Chapter 3, I show that long-term memory can optimize perception in complex natural scenes by modulating preparatory attention as well as target processing, using electroencephalography (EEG). In Chapter 4, exploiting the high temporal and spatial resolution of magnetoencephalography (MEG), I explore the neurophysiological markers of encoding, while participants learned contextual associations. In the final experimental chapter (Chapter 5), in a series of experiments I test the low-level mechanisms through which the long-term memory-bias in attentional guidance comes about. In the General Discussion (Chapter 6), I summarize my Findings and incorporate them into the existing literature, and propose outstanding questions.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Results of Experiment 3.

<p>a) Sensitivity scores and b) reaction times (for target present trials only) for each cue type (LSF, HSF) by memory condition (memory, no-memory), grouped by ISI (100 ms, 700 ms). Error bars represent standard errors.</p

Results from the Bayesian null-hypothesis testing.

<p>Evidence for both the null and alternative hypothesis for the spatial-frequency by memory interaction are presented for all three experiments.</p

Paradigm and Results of Experiment 2.

<p>a) Trial sequence in the orienting task. A jittered pre-trial fixation was followed by one of three types of cue: non-filtered, low- or high-spatial-frequency filtered image. This was followed by a variable inter-stimulus interval, and finally the target image, which was never filtered. Participants had to indicate with a mouse press whether or not there was a target currently present in the target image. b) Sensitivity scores and c) reaction times (for target present trials only) for each cue type (NSF, LSF, HSF) by memory condition (memory, no-memory). Error bars represent standard errors.</p

Functional_Consequences_of_Social_Attention_Adult_EEG

Social attention when viewing natural social (compared to non-social) images has functional consequences on contextual memory in healthy human adults. In addition to attention affecting memory performance, strong evidence suggests that memory in turn affects attentional orienting. Here we ask whether the effects of social processing on memory alter subsequent memory-guided attention orienting, and corresponding anticipatory dynamics of 8-12 Hz alpha-band oscillations as measured with EEG. Eighteen young adults searched for targets in scenes that contained either social or non-social distracters and their memory precision tested. Subsequently, reaction time was measured as participants oriented to targets appearing in those scenes at either valid (previously learned) locations or invalid (different) locations. Memory precision was poorer for target locations in social scenes. In addition, distractor type moderated the validity effect during memory-guided attentional orienting, with a larger cost in reaction time when targets appeared at invalid (different) locations within scenes with social distractors. The poorer memory performance was also marked by reduced anticipatory dynamics of spatially lateralized 8-12 Hz alpha-band oscillations for scenes with social distractors. The functional consequences of a social attention bias therefore extend from memory to memory-guided attention orienting, a bi-directional chain that may further reinforce attentional biases

Landmark-dependent Navigation Strategy Declines across the Human Life-Span: Evidence from Over 37,000 Participants

International audienceAbstract Humans show a remarkable capacity to navigate various environments using different navigation strategies, and we know that strategy changes across the life span. However, this observation has been based on studies of small sample sizes. To this end, we used a mobile app–based video game (Sea Hero Quest) to test virtual navigation strategies and memory performance within a distinct radial arm maze level in over 37,000 participants. Players were presented with six pathways (three open and three closed) and were required to navigate to the three open pathways to collect a target. Next, all six pathways were made available and the player was required to visit the pathways that were previously unavailable. Both reference memory and working memory errors were calculated. Crucially, at the end of the level, the player was asked a multiple-choice question about how they found the targets (i.e., a counting-dependent strategy vs. a landmark-dependent strategy). As predicted from previous laboratory studies, we found the use of landmarks declined linearly with age. Those using landmark-based strategies also performed better on reference memory than those using a counting-based strategy. These results extend previous observations in the laboratory showing a decreased use of landmark-dependent strategies with age