Sex differences in virtual navigation influenced by visual factors and individual differences

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Title Sex differences in virtual navigation influenced by visual factors and individual differences
Publication Type thesis
School or College College of Social & Behavioral Science
Department Psychology
Author Padilla, Lace M.k.
Date 2016
Description The Morris water maze is a task adapted from the animal spatial cognition literature and has been studied in the context of sex differences in humans, particularly because of the standard design, which manipulates proximal (close) and distal (far) cues. However, there are mixed findings with respect to the interaction of cues and sex differences in virtual Morris water maze tasks, which may be attributed to variations in the scale of the space and previously unmeasured individual differences. We explore the question of scale and context by presenting participants with an outdoor virtual Morris water maze that is four times the size of the mazes previously tested. We also measured lifetime mobility and mental rotation skills. Results of this study suggest that for the small-scale environment, males and females performed similarly when asked to navigate with only proximal cues. However, males outperformed females when only distal cues were visible. In the large-scale environment, males outperformed females in both cue conditions. Additionally, greater mental rotation skills predicted better navigation performance with proximal cues only. Finally, we found that highly mobile females and males perform equally well when navigating with proximal cues.
Type Text
Publisher University of Utah
Subject individual differences; mental rotation; mobility; spatial abilities; virtual Morris water maze
Dissertation Name Master of Science
Language eng
Rights Management ©Lace M.k. Padilla
Format application/pdf
Format Medium application/pdf
Format Extent 26,641 bytes
Identifier etd3/id/4093
ARK ark:/87278/s67t0x1k
Setname ir_etd
ID 197643
Reference URL https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s67t0x1k
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