Development of Landmark Knowledge at Decision Points

Two experiments investigated how people develop different landmark knowledge at decision points. Participants learned a route in a virtual city once or five times. One distinctive landmark was placed at each intersection of the route. At test, participants were released at each intersection according to the learning order and were required to determine the turning direction. At each intersection, the landmark was removed (no landmark), correctly placed (one landmark), duplicated on the other side (two identical landmarks), or misplaced from another intersection (two different landmarks) to disrupt the landmark sequence. The results suggested that humans develop different landmark knowledge (landmark knowledge for guidance, landmark knowledge for place recognition and knowledge of landmark sequence) with different navigation experience.