On spatial cognition and mobility strategies
pp. 137-166
in: Edwige Pissaloux (ed), Mobility of visually impaired people, Berlin, Springer, 2018Abstract
People acquire spatial knowledge by physically experiencing the environment through locomotion. Spatial knowledge generally emerges from the interactions between the specific types of sensory data and the cognitive strategies involved in locomotion. This chapter reviews the fundamental concepts and evidences of spatial cognition. First, the interplay between visual data and mobility is addressed. The importance of landmarks and visual cues is highlighted for implementing both simple and complex navigation strategies such as path integration (PI), landmark-based, and geometry-based, which are the main cognitive mechanisms for spatial learning. Some neural evidences of spatial cognition are given to underline the brain mechanisms involved in cognitive mapping. A review of relevant literature models on cognitive mapping is also presented to better understand how spatial representations are formed at the level of the brain. The chapter provides some insights on how to adapt all these concepts for mobility and spatial knowledge assistance of people with visual impairments.