Individual differences in large-spaces orientation: g and beyond?

The relationships between the major abilities (g, Gv and Gc) and general processes in wayfinding (Updating one’s position, Route representation, and Survey representation) are analyzed. Seven wayfinding tasks were developed for the present study: two of them were field tasks and five were computerized. The participants were 111 psychology undergraduate students. Updating tasks were used as a criterion measure of large-scale space orientation. We tried to isolate the g effects over Gc and Gv. Structural equation modeling was used for the analyses. Results indicated that Updating one’s position was influenced by g and Gv_s (Gv_specific part), but not by Gc_s (Gc_specific part) or the remaining orientation processes. However, some of the Updating variance remains unexplained.