Influence of individual characteristics on spatial cognitive ability in desktop virtual environment and real scene

Using virtual geographic environment to simulate, express and reconstruct real environment is one of the main experimental research paradigms in the domain of spatial cognitive science. To investigate whether people’s cognitive performance in virtual environment is consistent with that in real environment, this paper designs a control experiment to test the spatial cognition differences of participants in desktop virtual environment and real environment, where the spatial cognition is decomposed into three dimensions: pattern cognition, object cognition and spatial response, so that the influence of individual characteristics on spatial cognition and its environmental effects can be deduced. The results show that: ① neither environment type nor individual characteristics have significant impact on the spatial cognition; ② the participants with geographical knowledge background, rotating their mental map, and using coordinated spatial reference frame have more detailed and accurate cognition on the spatial pattern; ③ the environment type has no significant effect on the path response, but has a significant effect on the corner response. Besides, the participants can identify the correct direction more effectively in virtual environment. The positive effect of their professional knowledge is significant, and MRT level and environment type have significant joint effect. These outcomes have proved that cognitive simulation experiments can work well in a desktop virtual environment. They are also instructive to establish personalized virtual environment according to user characteristics