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Updated: Dec 30, 2025
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The Spatial Memory Game: Testing the Relationship Between Spatial Language, Object Knowledge, and Spatial Cognition
Published on: February 19, 2018
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Word- and arrow-based Simon effects emerge for eccentrically presented location words and arrows
Chunming Luo1, Robert W Proctor2
1CAS Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, 16 Lincui Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing, 100101, China. luocm@psych.ac.cn.
Psychological Research
|January 21, 2020
Summary
Different spatial cues, like location words and arrow directions, influence task responses and interact with each other. This suggests these cues share common processing pathways, impacting the Simon effect.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Human Information Processing
- Spatial Cognition
Background:
- The Simon effect demonstrates how task-irrelevant spatial information influences response selection.
- Previous research has primarily studied location-based, word-based, or arrow-based Simon effects independently.
- Understanding the interaction between different types of spatial Simon effects is crucial for a comprehensive model of spatial cognition.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether location-based, word-based, and arrow-based Simon effects occur simultaneously within the same task.
- To examine the interaction between location-based Simon effects and word- or arrow-based Simon effects.
- To compare the location-based Simon effect in joint-attribute tasks with its effect in a pure location-based task.
Main Methods:
- Two experiments were conducted using stimuli presented in the left-right visual field.
- Experiment 1 used location words (left/right), while Experiment 2 used single-headed arrows (left/right pointing).
- Participants performed tasks where physical location and either word meaning or arrow direction varied jointly as task-irrelevant information.
Main Results:
- Location-based, word-based, and arrow-based Simon effects were observed in both mean reaction time (RT) and delta plots.
- Significant interactions were found between word/arrow-based Simon effects and the location-based Simon effect on mean RT.
- The location-based Simon effect in joint-attribute tasks was comparable to that in a pure location-based Simon task.
Conclusions:
- Multiple task-irrelevant spatial attributes can concurrently influence response selection within a single task.
- The interaction between different spatial Simon effects suggests shared underlying processing mechanisms rather than independent activation sources.
- These findings contribute to understanding how the brain integrates and processes conflicting spatial information during task performance.
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