Spatial scaling in congenitally blind and sighted individuals: similarities and differences

ABSTRACT

Spatial scaling refers to the ability to map distances between different-sized spaces. This ability has been predominantly investigated in sighted individuals using map-reading tasks. Studies with blind individuals using similar tasks were less informative with respect to spatial scaling. Therefore, the current study examined spatial scaling systematically in congenitally blind and blindfolded sighted individuals (N = 46, aged 8.5–45.0 years). Participants were presented with embossed maps containing a target and asked to indicate the similar position in a referent space. Scaling factors were systematically manipulated by varying the sizes between these spaces. Results indicated that blind participants performed less accurately than sighted individuals. After correcting for reversal errors, this difference disappeared. Our results support previous research showing differences between blind and sighted individuals when using maps, while at the same time qualifying these studies by suggesting that these differences may result from blind individuals’ propensity to interchange left-right directions.

KEYWORDS:

• Blindness
• spatial cognition
• spatial-scaling ability
• mapping task
• haptics

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Bogusław Marek, PhD OBE and employees of the Centre for the Adaptation of Didactic Materials for the Blind of The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin for their help with preparing the tactile stimuli.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Magdalena Szubielska http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8437-0871

Wenke Möhring http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9152-8470

Marta Szewczyk http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9223-495X

Notes

1 After consulting with experts in the preparation of tactile graphics for blind individuals, it was found that larger and smaller maps than the ones used in the current study are hardly interpretable by touch.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Science Centre Poland [grant number: 2017/01/X/HS6/00414].