Egocentric Dominance in Spatial Representations: The Role of Environmental Familiarity in Building Cognitive Maps

Mental representations of spatial layouts and object locations are essential for building cognitive maps, which primarily rely on allocentric and egocentric reference frames. However, it remains unclear which reference frame individuals prefer for spatial processing, and how environmental familiarity may modulate these representations.

Following Marchette et al. (2014), we conducted a longitudinal fMRI study in which subjects freely explored a virtual park and memorized the locations of 32 objects distributed across four museums under low and high familiarity conditions. During the fMRI scanning, the subjects performed a spatial judgment task to study how the brain constructs spatial reference frames.

Behavioral results revealed a consistent preference for an egocentric reference frame for spatial processing, regardless of environmental familiarity. Moreover, egocentric representations were more influenced by location than direction, especially in less familiar environments.

The analysis of fMRI data showed that the retrosplenial complex (RSC) and parahippocampal place area (PPA) supported egocentric encoding. Although no allocentric encoding effect was observed, the entorhinal cortex (EC) exhibited significant sex differences in neural pattern similarity in the fully familiar condition, with males showing higher similarity than females. These findings suggest a robust egocentric cognitive map and underscore the need to consider individual and environmental factors in understanding how cognitive maps are constructed.