Processing of Information about Location during Locomotion: Effects of Amount of Visual Information about the Locomotor Patterns

Abstract

How maintenance of orientation during locomotion in unfamiliar environments is accomplished was investigated by presenting subjects ( n = 32) a target in different locations in a dark room, having them walk linearly behind a moving light line (1.12 m/sec.), and from a stopping point 12 and 22.6 m away, numerically estimate direction and distance to the target. An equal number of subjects was assigned to each of 2 × 2 treatment levels: the starting point either visible or invisible from the stopping point and the target either visible only from the starting point or throughout each trial. In the conditions with invisible targets there were mainly negative effects of the visible starting point, partially the same as those previously obtained for a concurrent task during locomotion. The results suggested that maintenance of orientation is achieved by recurrent central processing of information, which if postponed leads to impaired performance mainly because forgetting occurs.