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Abstract

In two experiments 17- (mean age=17;10), II- (mean age=11;7), 9- (mean age=9;7), and 7-year-olds (mean age = 7;7) walked along a straight line between two locations in a large-scale environment. They were then asked to estimate: (a) the distance from the beginning of the walk to the occurrence of a critical event that had occurred along the walk, and (b) the time taken to traverse various parts of the walk. In experiment 1 each half of the walked distance was traversed in varying amounts of time, with the critical event occurring halfway between the two locations. In experiment 2 the time taken to traverse each part of the walk was held constant but the distance to the occurrence of the critical event was varied. The results indicated that only younger children's estimates of the distance traversed in an environment may be influenced by the time taken to traverse that distance.

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Time and Distance in Spatial Cognition Development

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