Effects Of External Instructions And Positive Feedback On The Navigation Performance Of Individuals With Different Navigation Strategy Preferences

Navigation plays an important role in everyday life,but there are some individual differences in navigation strategy preferences.Previous research has found that individuals with place strategy preferences can quickly develop distinct environmental representations and always maintain better navigation performance,but individuals with non-place strategy preferences are also able to improve navigation performance through changes in external instructions.It has also been suggested that receiving positive feedback also affects task performance from a motivational perspective in relation to Social Cognitive Theory,which explains the internal factors affecting navigation performance.In order to help individuals with non-place strategy preferences improve their navigation performance,this study appropriately refined the virtual environment in the Dual Solution Paradigm(DSP)in terms of interface presentation,explored internal and external factors that can influence navigation performance of individuals with different navigation strategy preferences,and attempted to explore the relationship between navigation strategy preference and the actual navigation ability.Study 1 verified the objectivity and validity of the two navigation strategy classifications by coding navigation routes to capture the navigation strategy preferences of participants,and explore gender differences in navigation strategy preferences.Study 2 explored the effect of external instructions on the navigation performance of individuals from the perspective that the navigation strategies that individuals prefer to use are not equivalent to the navigation abilities that they actually have.Study 3 continued to validate the effect of external instructions on the navigation performance of individuals with non-place strategy preferences based on Study 2 and explored the internal motivational factors that influenced the navigation performance of individuals with non-place strategy preferences by manipulating positive feedback with different ambiguities.The results found that(1)The place strategy preference group had significantly higher strategy index than the non-place strategy preference group,and gender differences were found in navigation strategy preferences,with males preferring to adopt place strategies more than females(Study 1).(2)Individuals with non-place strategy preferences had better navigation performance for shortcut external instructions than general external instructions,mainly reflected by an increase in the number of shortcuts(Study 2).(3)There was no difference in the number of shortcuts taken by individuals with place strategy preferences before and after receiving shortcut external instructions,but there was a decrease in the number of shortcuts after receiving general external instructions instead(Study 2).(4)When individuals with non-place strategy preferences navigated by general external instructions,their navigation performance was significantly better in the positive ambiguous feedback than in the nofeedback condition,as evidenced by taking less time to navigate,finding a greater number of targets,and taking more shortcuts(Study 3).(5)Individuals with non-place strategy preferences tended to have optimal navigation performance under shortcut external instructions without feedback,as reflected by significantly shorter navigation time under the no-feedback condition than under the positive precise feedback condition(Study 3).Based on previous experiments,this study further explored ways to improve the navigation performance of individuals with different navigation strategy preferences by visualizing navigation strategies through the DSP virtual environment.Specific external instructions can promote the navigation performance of individuals with nonplace strategy preferences,indicating that what navigation strategies individuals prefer to use and their actual navigation abilities are separable,revealing the plasticity of navigation abilities,and also enriching the experimental findings related to individual differences in navigation strategies and navigation abilities.From the application point of view,the findings of this study can help individuals who easily lose their way and cannot find their destination during daily navigation to recognize their preferred navigation strategies and effectively adjust them while assessing their navigation abilities.This study has implications for the scientific design of navigation aids,as well as for the effective training of spatial learning.