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Real world navigation independence in the early blind correlates with differential brain activity associated with virtual navigation.

ABSTRACT: Navigating is a complex cognitive task that places high demands on spatial abilities, particularly in the absence of sight. Significant advances have been made in identifying the neural correlates associated with various aspects of this skill; however, how the brain is able to navigate in the absence of visual experience remains poorly understood. Furthermore, how neural network activity relates to the wide variability in navigational independence and skill in the blind population is also unknown. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we investigated the neural correlates of audio-based navigation within a large scale, indoor virtual environment in early profoundly blind participants with differing levels of spatial navigation independence (assessed by the Santa Barbara Sense of Direction scale). Performing path integration tasks in the virtual environment was associated with activation within areas of a core network implicated in navigation. Furthermore, we found a positive relationship between Santa Barbara Sense of Direction scores and activation within right temporal parietal junction during the planning and execution phases of the task. These findings suggest that differential navigational ability in the blind may be related to the utilization of different brain network structures. Further characterization of the factors that influence network activity may have important implications regarding how this skill is taught in the blind community.

SUBMITTER: Halko MA

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3954447 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:How vision guides gaze in realistic settings has been researched for decades. Human gaze behavior is typically measured in laboratory settings that are well controlled but feature-reduced and movement-constrained, in sharp contrast to real-life gaze control that combines eye, head, and body movements. Previous real-world research has shown environmental factors such as terrain difficulty to affect gaze; however, real-world settings are difficult to control or replicate. Virtual reality (VR) offers the experimental control of a laboratory, yet approximates freedom and visual complexity of the real world (RW). We measured gaze data in 8 healthy young adults during walking in the RW and simulated locomotion in VR. Participants walked along a pre-defined path inside an office building, which included different terrains such as long corridors and flights of stairs. In VR, participants followed the same path in a detailed virtual reconstruction of the building. We devised a novel hybrid control strategy for movement in VR: participants did not actually translate: forward movements were controlled by a hand-held device, rotational movements were executed physically and transferred to the VR. We found significant effects of terrain type (flat corridor, staircase up, and staircase down) on gaze direction, on the spatial spread of gaze direction, and on the angular distribution of gaze-direction changes. The factor world (RW and VR) affected the angular distribution of gaze-direction changes, saccade frequency, and head-centered vertical gaze direction. The latter effect vanished when referencing gaze to a world-fixed coordinate system, and was likely due to specifics of headset placement, which cannot confound any other analyzed measure. Importantly, we did not observe a significant interaction between the factors world and terrain for any of the tested measures. This indicates that differences between terrain types are not modulated by the world. The overall dwell time on navigational markers did not differ between worlds. The similar dependence of gaze behavior on terrain in the RW and in VR indicates that our VR captures real-world constraints remarkably well. High-fidelity VR combined with naturalistic movement control therefore has the potential to narrow the gap between the experimental control of a lab and ecologically valid settings.

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Real world navigation independence in the early blind correlates with differential brain activity associated with virtual navigation.

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