When it comes to navigating areas, young children are a lot smarter than we give them credit for. Although past studies have proposed that our navigational abilities don’t truly kick in until the age of 12, a new study puts these claims to rest, revealing that children as young as 5 can find their way around large spaces.
The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, demonstrated the surprising cognitive capacity of five-year-olds as they navigated a tiny virtual town. Aiming to grasp how the brain develops at a young age, the study also showed how science can be introduced to children in a productive and engaging way.
How Does the Brain Aid Navigation?
One of the perennial dilemmas of neuroscience is distinguishing what knowledge comes baked into our brains at birth and what knowledge develops over time. Studies have used functional MRI (fMRI) technology to understand the brain on a deeper level, measuring brain activity by following changes in blood flow.
The researchers involved with this study previously concentrated on three regions of the adult brain that allow us to familiarize ourselves with the areas we navigate. It starts with the parahippocampal place area (PPA), which lets us recognize places and assign them to different categories. Then, the retrosplenial complex (RSC) maps these places within a larger space. Finally, as we navigate our immediate surroundings, the occipital place area (OPA) keeps us from bumping into obstacles.
In 2024, the researchers found that the system associated with the OPA doesn’t fully develop until the age of 8. However, they theorized that younger children must still be able to create a map of their surroundings, even before they can walk well.
Read More: Why Can’t We Remember Our Memories as a Baby, if we Make Them?
Exploring a Tiny Town
The new study confirmed that the RSC (responsible for map-based navigation in larger spaces) is already well-developed in children younger than 8. The results come from an immersive experiment that involved five-year-old participants who became acquainted with a virtual location called “Tiny Town.”
The researchers stressed the importance of creativity to make experiments fun for children, which is why they gave Tiny Town entertaining landmarks like ice cream stores, playgrounds, and fire stations. The town itself was fashioned as a triangle, with each point marked by a certain landscape: They were dubbed the mountain corner, the tree corner, and the lake corner.
“We want to get at the scientific questions that we’re trying to answer, but it’s also important that a child who participates in a study has a good time,” said Yaelan Jung, first author of the study and a postdoctoral fellow at Emory University’s Department of Psychology, in a statement. “We want them to leave with a good impression of science.”
Understanding Children’s Brains
After being introduced to Tiny Town, the children were encouraged to explore its streets by using arrow keys on the computer to move. Once they were familiar with the layout, they were tested on the buildings and features they saw, with most children passing the test.
From here, the researchers conducted fMRI scans on the children, all while ensuring their comfort. While the scans were happening, the children participated in a game-like task in which they were shown pairs of images from Tiny Town and pressed a button if the images accurately correlated. Data from the scans ultimately proved that the children were able to create a map in their minds, using the RSC in their brains to facilitate navigation in larger spaces.
The next step, the researchers say, is to look into the brain development of toddlers, which may require even more clever strategies to keep them engaged in an experiment.
“It’s fascinating to explore how humans use different parts of the brain for complex behaviors and how that changes with age and experiences,” Jung said in the press release. “We’re laying the groundwork for clinical applications, including getting a better understanding of typical versus atypical neural development.”
Read More: Supporting A Child’s Rapidly Developing Brain
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Jack Knudson is an assistant editor at Discover with a strong interest in environmental science and history. Before joining Discover in 2023, he studied journalism at the Scripps College of Communication at Ohio University and previously interned at Recycling Today magazine.
