Individual differences in spatial navigation and working memory
Intelligence. Sorry, but not an open access downloadable article 😕
Abstract
Spatial navigation is a complex skill that relies on many aspects of cognition. Our study aims to clarify the role of working memory in spatial navigation, and particularly, the potentially separate contributions of verbal and visuospatial working memory. We leverage individual differences to understand how working memory differs among types of navigators and the predictive utility of verbal and visuospatial working memory. Data were analyzed from N = 253 healthy, young adults. Participants completed multiple measures of verbal and visuospatial working memory and a spatial navigation task called Virtual Silcton. We found that better navigators may rely more on visuospatial working memory. Additionally, using a relative weights analysis, we found that visuospatial working memory accounts for a large majority of variance in spatial navigation when compared to verbal working memory. Our results suggest individual differences in working memory are domain-specific in this context of spatial navigation, with visuospatial working memory being the primary contributor.
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As an FYI. The WJ V has a new cognitive Visual Working Memory test that I created. Unfortunately, it was not included in the original WJ V launch and will be added in a later release…not sure when…no one has told me…but I think this fall.
The back story is that this test was in development for over 30 years by yours truly. For the WJ III I developed, and we normed, a visual working memory test where examinee’s were shown a abstract line-based image on a dotted grid and were instructed to rotate the image in their mind (after the test stimuli figure was removed) and then draw the rotated image on a identical blank grid. The idea of examinees drawing their response was to add additional clinical information about visual-motor abilities, in addition to visual working memory. Unfortunately, after being completely normed, we learned via inter-rater reliability studies that the scoring reliability was not adequate…darn.
The second attempt was an earlier version of the current WJ V Visual Working Memory test that had already been printed for the WJ IV norming test books. The WJ IV version was shelved at the last minute due to cost issues as a result of the financial crises at the end of the Bush presidency. We were instructed to reduce the cost of the WJ IV norming. This test simply had too many printed test easel pages (was called a “page eater”) and was eliminated…double darn.
However, this turned out to be a blessing in disguise. With the new digital testing platform, the WJ IV version was now presented without a concern for the number of pages, and more importantly, it could have a much more complex and informative underlying scoring system since all taps on an asymetrical response grid were recorded (which was a richer set of response data than the original WJ IV version). As stated in the WJ V technical manual (LaForte, Dailey & McGrew, 2025, p. 40):
The Visual Working Memory test requires the use of visual working memory “in the context of processing” (Maehara & Saito, 2007). For each item, the examinee briefly studies a pattern of stimulus dots inside of randomly placed squares on the screen and then must recall the specific locations of the dots. The presentation and recall screens are separated by a quick and simple visual discrimination distractor item. This test requires the examinee to maintain information in working memory while actively processing the distractor requirements. Once the distractor task is completed, it must be quickly removed from active memory to focus on recalling the locations of the stimulus dots (Burgoyne et al., 2022). Errors of both omission (i.e., erroneously recalling a dot in a box where no dot was present) and commission (i.e., failing to identify a box associated with a dot's correct location) are both factored into the test's scoring model; however, heavier emphasis is placed on visual recall through a relatively higher penalty for errors of commission.
Validity information in the WJ V TM provides evidence that the new Visual Working Memory test is a mixed measure of Gv and Gwm. Preliminary evidence (inspection of growth curves and standard deviation distributional characteristics) was interpreted as being consistent with other measures of executive functioning. Additional concurrent validity studies with established measures of executive functioning are needed before an evidence-based claim of executive functioning score variance can clearly be established.
I think the 30+ year wait was worth it. I’m very proud of this test in its current form. A “shout out” to Dr. Erica LaForte and David Dailey for creating such a response-rich stream of data for scoring…something that was not possible in the planned non-digital WJ III and WJ IV versions.
