IMPACT OF COGNITIVE STYLE ON SPATIAL KNOWLEDGE ACQUISITION

A user's cognitive style impacts the way they organize and process information. This paper considers how cognitive style impacts a user's ability to acquire spatial knowledge from a range of virtual environments. Our results show that holist (field independent) users acquire spatial knowledge faster in low complex large environments, which support learning of relative visual references. Analytic (field dependent) users acquire spatial knowledge faster in complex environments, which obstruct the field of view and therefore support procedural learning. User specific limitations must be considered when defining required exposure time in virtual training environments.