The research at hand aims to clarify whether movement control (i.e., driving a vehicle) leads to genuinely better spatial learning than the observation of this movement (i.e., co-driving), or whether such an advantage depends on factors that are frequently, but not necessarily entangled with controlling movement of a vehicle: For example, research on active navigation suggests that the execution of movement could be less important than the decision where to move. Thus, a navigating co-driver may not be disadvantaged as compared to a driver who follows navigational instructions. Two series of experiments were conducted to test the hypothesis that spatial learning depends on an active encoding of the spatial information, but that controlling movement does not provide general and inherent advantages in spatial learning as compared to observing this moving. (Author/publisher)
Abstract