Abstract
Priming and explicit memory studies have demonstrated that viewers form mental representations of a scene's spatial layout. This study examined whether these representations are dependent on the observer's current viewpoint. Two experiments using photographs and computer generated scenes looked at the effect of changes in viewpoint within the scene on distance judgments. Participants viewed a prime followed by a target and were asked to judge the location of two items in the target scene. The prime was either the same view as the target or a changed view. The angle between the prime and the target view varied between 0 and 90 degrees. Reaction time increased as the viewpoint change between the prime and the target view increased. The results suggest that these spatial layout representations are view dependent. Implications regarding the use of layout representations are discussed.