EMOctober 19, 2009 22:13 EST

I am rather stunned that this article completely ignored a major factor in cognitive mapping: Gender differences.

It has long been held that men tend to navigate quite differently than women do. Indeed, you did begin to address the issue when you spoke of the 2 major categories of human mapping strategies. Males tend to favour the spatial strategy approach, while females favour the stimulus-response approach.

We all know this as rich fodder for the stand-up comedians who joke about the husband who refuses to ask directions. But, in fact, there is a solid scientific basis for this.

Early males hunted, while females remained at camps, tending to all the other business of life. That “tending” engendered considerable communication amongst each other, which could explain the propensity for females to adopt the stimulus-response approach.

Meanwhile, “back at the ranch” (literally), men were out chasing game; those who couldn’t use an adaptive spatial strategy to find their way home, tended to be naturally selected-out of the reproductively lucky by hungry predators …

Ergo, female tendencies towards stimulus-response, males towards spatial techniques.

It’s certainly something that seems to prevail amongst most primates. In those ape species that are gregarious, males who reach young adulthood are kicked out of the tribe, while females tend to remain. Young bachelors, then, are predisposed to wander and essentially become geographers, while female primates may never in their entire lives leave the sanctity of the tiny zone they were born in.

However, the other possibility is that stimulus-response was natural for both males and females, but tended to be selected out for males due to their overwhelming need to develop the spatial strategy.

In any event, evolution has had its merry way and we end up with the oh-so-common scenario of the gal insisting on stopping to ask directions while the guy insists on trusting his instincts.

And if it weren’t for that, half the stand-up comics today would be out of business!

Mark HarrisonOctober 21, 2009 20:15 EST

Great article and thanks EM for the comments. U really nailed the source of the gender differences. From my experience, it appears quite true that people who rely on their GPS NAV units to tell them where to drive don't properly learn the city they're in. It's similar to how we didn't really learn our city when our parents drove us around.. we were just passive observers, which isn't conducive to retention. As a former cab-driver, I relied exclusively on my map-book, vs. memorizing streets. I've read that in certain Central-American cities, street addresses aren't really used and everyone memorizes places with a stimulus-response style. I would be lost. In any case, here's a useful tip for travel to those fun but confusing non-grid cities: rent a bike if U can. U learn so much more and it's so easy to pull over to look at a map, or ask directions. (U don't even need to know the language.. just say excuse me and the placename you're looking for and and point to where U think it may be.)

Alex HutchinsonOctober 26, 2009 19:13 EST

"Males tend to favour the spatial strategy approach, while females favour the stimulus-response approach."

Thanks for the comments — interesting stuff. I just wanted to point out, though, that the above statement is incorrect. Here's what McGill's Veronique Bohbot had to say on the topic:

"There are sex differences in navigation; however, women and men use spatial and response strategies in equal proportions. In fact, there are many studies that show that women are better than men on spatial tasks that require knowledge about the relative position of objects in an environment. Studies of hippocampal volume in men and women support this: women have bigger hippocampi than men!

So women navigate using objects/landmarks more than men. We showed, in one of our experiments, that if you remove landmarks, women become impaired relative to men. This study suggests that men are better at using non-spatial strategies than women to compensate for the lack of landmarks. Many other studies in the literature suggest that men use Euclidian and polar coordinates (e.g. Go 2 miles north, then head west for 1.5 miles). So sex differences in navigation show a male advantage or a female advantage depending on the nature of the task."

CNOctober 29, 2009 09:37 EST

The atrophy of certain skills is a normal part of technological development, e.g. handwriting before introduction of the typewriter; thinking when writing before intro of the word processor; carrying out simple calculation in one's head before the calculator; knowledge of medicinal plants before pills, and many others. Even using maps as opposed to navigating from memory involves loss of certain environmental awareness. As a result, a person today may be less likely to survive on a desert island than Robinson Crusoe. Yet, all of those technologies clearly benefit society. GPS is no different, and the benefits are countless. I only wish that GPS devices could have larger, high-resolution screens so that one could simultaneously see a larger portion of a city's map in order to develop a general idea of the relationships between various landmarks. GPS displays force us to look through a keyhole, and that is why we cannot develop a good knowledge of a new city when using them.

JanisOctober 29, 2009 14:33 EST

I'm constantly skeptical about gender differences, mostly because I'm constantly the one little blip that blows the theory away, and I've been like this my whole life. Perfectly female, and scarily able to form nonlinear visual structures in my head — all those "find your way" and "rotate this in your mind" tests? There's always a little glob of women in the so-so area, a glob of men in the "pretty good" area, and then me sitting there as the lone little data point up in the "incapable of getting lost" area. I've flawlessly driven places that I haven't been to in twenty years; and even if I didn't know where I was headed while I was behind the wheel, just turning where it felt right got me there.

Oddly enough considering the mention of faceblindness, I'm also one of those people who never forgets a face. I took those faceblindness tests online and scored 100%. Most people only score 75% or so. So either I'm a guy and haven't know it for 43 years, or else there's a lot more to these skills than just "girls can't boys can."

Nick PiercyNovember 01, 2009 11:54 EST

It occurred to me after reading this article that there are potential parallels to be drawn with people's ability to employ tactical or strategic thinking, albeit an abstract form of spatial mapping.

To be able to think strategically someone essentially has to have a cognitive map of both the underlying theory, and how various issues and the desired outcome interlink with each other. This takes a large amount of effort and time relative to a tactic of working through an immediate solution that would seem to suit best, and changing if this doesn't work.

Does this feel right to other people?

Nick PiercyNovember 01, 2009 11:55 EST

It occurred to me after reading this article that there are potential parallels to be drawn with people's ability to employ tactical or strategic thinking, albeit an abstract form of spatial mapping.

To be able to think strategically someone essentially has to have a cognitive map of both the underlying theory, and how various issues and the desired outcome interlink with each other. This takes a large amount of effort and time relative to a tactic of working through an immediate solution that would seem to suit best, and changing if this doesn't work.

Does this feel right to other people?

Don BrownNovember 11, 2009 14:05 EST

I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed the article. It touches so many areas of my life.

Ex-air traffic controller and safety rep. I've shared it with every pilot and controller I know.

Current hot-air balloon chaser. The pilot and I go round-and-round with (mostly) good-natured humor about this subject. I use a map. He uses GPS.

I have a daughter that has never been "lost". She's gone a long way out of her way...but she's never been "lost". She has GPS and refuses to look at a map.

Excellent article.

Don Brown

Jeff RobbinsNovember 17, 2009 16:02 EST

I'm currently writing a paper on the flip side of GPS navigation ("GPS Navigation...But What is it Doing To Us?") and intend to cite "Global Impositioning Systems" (great title)in the paper. I also hope to use it in the Research Writing Course I'm teaching at Rutgers University as a reference for my students.

Viz a viz research, I've dredged up most of the sources cited by Hutchinson. The research source by Claudio Aporta and Eric Higgs (I've had contact with Higgs many years ago)on Inuit wayfinding before and after GPS is especially interesting.

Re CN's comment on the countless benefits of technology, including GPS, while that's true - each and every successful product does something for us mainly by eliminating some kind of effort - the problem is that the mental, physical, and social atrophy resulting from each and every losing it for not using it sums. From my perspective, the sum of all good things doing it all for us, is also doing it to us and what it's doing is not so good.

ElcoFebruary 01, 2010 03:26 EST

Nice article....keep writing

FMJuly 11, 2011 11:05 EST

While I do agree that some people are "geograhically challenged" just as I am "technology challenged". I do have to disagree with "ED" who states that the difference is a "men v. women" problem, with that said why is it that men refuse to even admit they are "lost/misplaced" or "ask for directions"? My father when I was learning to drive would blindfold me, take me into a part of town I did not know, get out of the car, and tell me "find your way home" on the seat was something called "Arrow Street Guide (ASG)". Before I would even pick it up I would look at the position of the sun, if there was sun that day. I would begin by driving north, then seeking out a large intersection. Once there I would look at the ASG to figure out where I was. One time I made it home before he did, he knew then and there I would probably not get as lost as another. On the other hand, my brother still to this day has problems with dirctions, however rarely uses the GPS built into his phone, preferring a map or atlas. Before you ask, "yes I have been lost, yes I always have a map with me, yes I have used GPS which for me is a hindrance, because I use both the sight(s) of where I am, plus landmarks (GPS also many times takes us the "long way" instead of using a shorter distance route). While turn by turn directions is great when going someplace new, getting lost can be an adventure in itself especially when you find a new place to have coffe, shop, or a small park that you have never been to or heard of.

While I think GPS is a great tool, it has major drawbacks, siting the accidents in the article, also a recent accident on Onondaga Lake Parkway (http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2011/05/megabus_driver_arraigned_on_cr.html), where a double-decker bus loaded with passengers from NYC slammed into a low bridge, due to the fact that the bus driver never saw the more than five "LOW BRIDGE" signs, btw there are more than four of these bridges, which are actually railroad trestles, in the Syracuse, NY area which have been hit because drivers do not read the posted signs. The problem is NOT the bridges, but the drivers who rely on GPS to get them there.

In my opinion, while we become more and more reliant on technology, I do think our brains become more atrophied, and we become more reliant on "what is easy".

JSAugust 03, 2011 12:08 EST

I think - if used correctly - that GPS could very well have the exact opposite effect. Like so many other tools, it is a good servant but poor master.

Many people seem to allow it to become the master, slavishly following each and every word of the gizmo. Don't do that.

The ENTIRE POINT of GPS is that, unlike written-down instructions, etc, it ALWAYS knows where you are and how to get from here to where you're going. If you miss a turn, it'll calculate a new route, if you ignore it, it'll calculate a new route when you eventually want it, allowing you to explore, roam about wherever you want building those spatial maps and whatnot without ever having to worry about getting truly lost.

Use the satnav as a backup, as a tool that allows you to familiarize your surroundings faster than you otherwise could and you become a better navigator for it. Let it take over your thinking, and, well duh, of course it hurts your sense of direction.