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Updated: Jul 11, 2026

The (Spatial) Memory Game: Testing the Relationship Between Spatial Language, Object Knowledge, and Spatial Cognition
Published on: February 19, 2018
Multiple systems of spatial memory and action
Marios N Avraamides1, Jonathan W Kelly
1Department of Psychology, University of Cyprus, P.O. Box 20537, 1678 Nicosia, Cyprus. mariosav@ucy.ac.cy
Abstract:
Recent findings from spatial cognition and cognitive neuroscience suggest that different types of mental representations could mediate the off-line retrieval of spatial relations from memory and the on-line guidance of motor actions in space. As a result, a number of models proposing multiple systems of spatial memory have been recently formulated. In the present article we review these models and we evaluate their postulates based on available experimental evidence. Furthermore, we discuss how a multiple-system model can apply to situations in which people reason about their immediate surroundings or non-immediate environments by incorporating a model of sensorimotor facilitation/interference. This model draws heavily on previous accounts of sensorimotor interference and takes into account findings from the stimulus-response compatibility literature.
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