Abstract
Prior research has indicated that verbal estimates of a target's distance may be dissociable from estimates of the target's distance assessed by walking to it with vision obscured (blind-walking). This study examined further the degree to which verbal and blind-walking estimates of distance are independent by investigating the relationship between errors made in verbal and blind-walking estimates. Subjects viewed targets placed at various distances between 10 and 80 feet. They estimated the distance to the target, shut their eyes and walked to the perceived distance of the previously seen target. Results demonstrated that verbal estimates were more variable than walking estimates. This finding indicates that the verbal estimates do not provide the basis for the walking estimate. Examination of data from individual trials showed that errors on the two measures were uncorrelated. This finding implies a high degree of independence between the substrates for the verbal and blind-walking distance estimates.