The Effects of Age, Spatial Ability, and Navigational Information on Navigational Performance

Abstract

The purpose of the study reported here was to examine whether age and spatial ability are factors that influence a driver' s ability to navigate and to use navigational displays. These factors were examined because previous research suggests that spatial ability may underlie navigational performance, including route-following and mapreading, and that these skills may diminish with age. Thus, older drivers and drivers with weak navigational skills, may have a heightened need for, and be particularly served by, in-vehicle route guidance displays found in Advanced Traveler Information Systems (ATIS).A total of 56 drivers were tested on spatial ability. The drivers then performed a navigational task in a part-task driving simulator using different navigational aids, including: (1) text directions, (2) an enlarged, mounted paper map, (3) a standard-scale paper map, and (4) a turn-by-turn route guidance ATIS display. The major findings were that: (1) older drivers showed worse navigational performance than younger drivers, (2) the worse performance found in the older group was attributable to their lower spatial ability, (3) spatial ability predicted navigational performance, and (4) a simulated ATIS turn-by-turn display enhanced navigational performance. The implications of the results are that navigational ability declines with age due to decrements in spatial ability and perceptual speed, and ATIS route guidance has the potential to facilitate navigational performance in drivers of varying spatial abilities and age.

Pointing the way forward: Gesture and adults’ recall of route direction information.

“…1999; Wochinger & Boehm-Davis, 1995). Spatial mental representations require listeners to select and organize salient information about the environment and map that information onto an internal representation (Tversky & Kessell, 2014).…”

Spatial Ability Subfactors and Their Influences on a Computer-Based Information Search Task

“…Participants needed to be aware of their current position and its relationship to both the goal and to the origin. Use of this aid was expected to be more successful and efficient for people with higher spatial abilities (Wochinger & Boehm-Davis, 1995).…”

Has the Time Come for Older Driver Vehicle?

“…Although the research on older drivers' use of advanced technology is limited and is generally conducted with small sample sizes, a number of studies have documented that older adults often use ITS technologies differently than younger people [73,[90][91][92][93][94][95]. For example, in an evaluation of Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation assistance technology, Kostyniuk, Streff, and Eby [93] found that older drivers used GPS more frequently than younger drivers but reported that it was their passenger who interacted with the navigation system.Studies also report that older drivers take much longer to learn how to use ITS technology [73,93,96].…”