Distance Estimates of Children as a Function of Type of Activity in the Environment.

COHEN, SHELA, and COHEN, ROBERT. Distance Estimates of Children as a Function of Type of Activity in the Environment. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1982, 53, 834-837. To assess the influence of activity on the construction of spatial representations, first and sixth graders were assigned to each of 3 activity conditions. 5 common objects served as stimulus locations in an otherwise empty classroom. The child either walked through the environment (walk only condition), performed isolated tasks at four of the locations (interact only condition), or performed interdependent tasks ("writing and mailing a letter") at 4 of the locations (interact/linked condition). Following acquisition, each child estimated all pair-wise interobject distances. Sixth graders estimated distances more accurately than first graders. Children of both age groups in the interact/linked condition were more accurate in their estimates than children in either of the other conditions which did not differ statistically from each other. These results suggest that providing a theme which functionally relates activity among landmarks facilitates the acquisition of a spatial representation.