Trends in Cognitive Sciences
Update
Research FocusSpatial cognition in apes and humans
Research Focus
Introduction
In two recent papers 1, 2, Haun and colleagues unite two important current lines of research: cross-linguistic studies of language and cognition [3], and studies in the comparative cognition of humans and great apes 4, 5.
This research draws on a large-scale investigation of cross-linguistic differences in spatial semantics 6, 7 that has identified three frames of reference that speakers use to identify the location of an object. The egocentric (or relative) frame describes the location of an object relative to the speaker, as in ‘the chair on my left’. The object-centered (or intrinsic) frame describes locations relative to a landmark object, as in ‘the chair in front of the fireplace’. Finally, the geocentric (or absolute) frame describes locations relative to a global frame, as in ‘the chair in the northwest corner’. Languages can use more than one of these frames, but in many cases one frame is dominant. In particular, the egocentric frame is dominant in English, Dutch and German, whereas the geocentric frame is dominant in Tzeltal (southern Mexico) and Hai||om (Namibia), among others. Using a clever set of tasks, researchers have amassed evidence that people given nonlinguistic spatial tasks show a strong tendency to use whichever frame is dominant in their language 3, 6 (but see Ref. [8]). This work has been a major impetus in reviving the Whorfian question of whether the language we speak influences the way we habitually think 9, 10, 11.
Evidence of linguistic effects on spatial cognition invites the question of how they develop. Do we begin life with natural proclivities or instead with ‘blank slates’ on which language, culture and other experience impose spatial frames? Haun et al. addressed this question in a bold and ingenious set of studies that combines cross-linguistic developmental comparisons with cross-species comparisons between humans and our close relatives, the great apes.
Section snippets
Spatial frame of reference
Haun et al.[1] compared Dutch and German speakers, whose language (like English) primarily uses an egocentric frame of reference, with speakers of Hai||om (a Khoisan language spoken in Namibia), which primarily uses a geocentric frame. They used a hide-and-search task with the five-object arrays shown in Figure 1. The subject (S) watched the experimenter hide Target 1 under one of the five identical objects on Table 1, then moved to Table 2 (now facing the opposite direction) and searched for
Encoding location versus features
In another study, Haun et al.[2] looked earlier in development at a different aspect of spatial cognition: do subjects track the location of a hidden object by its spatial location or by the features of its hiding place? They used a switch task – a kind of shell game but using distinctive ‘shells’ (inverted containers). A target was hidden under one container; then two containers were swapped while the display was occluded. Three-year-olds searched under the original container (in a new
Concluding remarks
Putting the two studies together, in one task [2], humans share a locational bias with apes at one year of age, but diverge to an object bias by three years. In the other [1], we share an allocentric bias with apes at four years and then diverge to an egocentric bias (or not) by eight years, according to language and culture. This suggests that different aspects of human acculturation influence different spatial representations and processes. For example, the early divergence of humans from
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by NSF SLC Grant SBE-0541957, the Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center (SILC).
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Cited by (14)
Alternative spin on phylogenetically inherited spatial reference frames
2019, CognitionCitation Excerpt :In the current paper, we focus on the lesser studied first question, which addresses the cognitive capacities children bring to learning spatial FoR terms (Haun et al., 2006; Shusterman & Li, 2016). We reconsider an influential study by Haun et al. (2006) that has frequently been cited in prominent review papers in cognitive and developmental psychology (e.g., Newcombe, Uttal, & Sauter, 2013; Henrich, Heine, & Norenzayan, 2010; Gentner, 2007). We reconcile, for the first time, the findings and claims made by this study with research from the spatial cognition literature on spatial updating and how context affects people’s preference for encoding spatial information using different FoRs.
Frames of reference in spatial language acquisition
2016, Cognitive PsychologyCitation Excerpt :Although children did not show evidence of responding differently when the conflict between their perspective and the experimenter’s was removed, children’s bias toward environment-based interpretations may arise as a more general heuristic to minimize ambiguity. A related possibility is that when referencing and locating something in space, it is preferable to choose a FoR using entities anchored to earth rather than entities that move, in order to maximize the stability of the representation of the location (Gentner, 2007; Haun et al., 2006). Hence, when forced to choose, children may weigh geocentric relations more heavily than object-centric relations.
Environment, cognition, and culture: Reconsidering the cognitive map
2013, Journal of Environmental PsychologyCitation Excerpt :Davies and Uttal (2007) point to several factors that might make it difficult for children to recognize the utility of using map-derived knowledge as a tool for thinking when they are faced with navigational challenges in spite of map-reading abilities. If we add to this account the emerging evidence that by eight years of age children also begin to evince the culture's ways of talking about spatial relations (Gentner, 2007; Haun, Rapold, Call, Janzen, & Levinson, 2006), the case for the influence of the developmental context on environmental cognition grows even stronger. Conceptual confusion ensues when researchers do not consider that the ‘cognitive map,’ taken to be a mental representation of spatial configuration, is a by-product of the interaction of tool use and discourse, stemming from concrete engagement with local environmental conditions over development, rather than arising from psychological processes taken independently of the environment.
Spatial reasoning in Tenejapan Mayans
2011, CognitionCitation Excerpt :In such tasks, Dutch speakers overwhelmingly produced egocentric responses, while Tseltal speakers primarily produced geocentric responses. This apparently stable correlation between spatial language and spatial reasoning has led several investigators to the conclusion that language shapes one’s underlying preferences for representing spatial relations (Levinson et al., 2002; Majid et al., 2004; Pederson et al., 1998; cf. Gentner, 2007). Specifically, it is argued that people “appear to code their everyday non-linguistic spatial representations in line with their linguistic frames of reference” (Majid et al., 2004, p. 108; cf. Pederson et al., 1998).
Relational reasoning in wild bumblebees revisited: the role of distance
2023, Scientific Reports