All those who wander are not lost
April 14, 2024 9:15 AM Subscribe
Why do some people always get lost? "While it’s easy to show that people differ in navigational ability, it has proved much harder for scientists to explain why. There’s new excitement brewing in the navigation research world, though. By leveraging technologies such as virtual reality and GPS tracking, scientists have been able to watch hundreds, sometimes even millions, of people trying to find their way through complex spaces, and to measure how well they do. Though there’s still much to learn, the research suggests that to some extent, navigation skills are shaped by upbringing."
Anecdotally, regular GPS use has definitely degraded my ability to orient and create mental maps. It's also interesting to see my teen kids and their friends have remarkably poor orientation and navigation skills, which I like to guess is because of a reliance on technology, but also because of less time spent exploring outside - getting lost and then found again.
GPS isn't disappearing. But I wonder if there aren't some innovations possible that would help build landmark memory on a route and/or help build mental maps, while still getting a person from A to B reliably and quickly.
posted by Kabanos at 9:49 AM on April 14 [7 favorites]
GPS isn't disappearing. But I wonder if there aren't some innovations possible that would help build landmark memory on a route and/or help build mental maps, while still getting a person from A to B reliably and quickly.
posted by Kabanos at 9:49 AM on April 14 [7 favorites]
As a person who does not get lost, and who continues to be startled when people explain that a bar is close by by pointing in the opposite direction of where it is, I suggest that those of you who do get lost stop logging landmarks and see if that helps you know where you are - versus jumping from point to point until you land at the last point. Or at least explain to me how you know that the McDonalds before the left turn on Elm is not one of the three other McDonalds that you pass while driving down Main Street.
(I have found that Google Maps is almost always wrong and even if you set a route that, for instance, avoids the traffic around the school at 3 p.m., it will drop, reconnect, and re-route you on the original bad route it picked. It's also big on sending you back to the last point on the "correct" route even if that means as much as doubling miles. If you want to have fun, compare some of the route Google Maps spits out to what you, looking at a big map, would do. Or compare to another GPS.)
posted by Lesser Shrew at 9:58 AM on April 14 [7 favorites]
(I have found that Google Maps is almost always wrong and even if you set a route that, for instance, avoids the traffic around the school at 3 p.m., it will drop, reconnect, and re-route you on the original bad route it picked. It's also big on sending you back to the last point on the "correct" route even if that means as much as doubling miles. If you want to have fun, compare some of the route Google Maps spits out to what you, looking at a big map, would do. Or compare to another GPS.)
posted by Lesser Shrew at 9:58 AM on April 14 [7 favorites]
I have above-average navigation skills, I'm good at path finding while driving or walking and get my bearings in new cities almost immediatley. Part of this is organic and part is having studied architecture.
My wife yesterday was saying how this makes me lack empathy for people without navigational skills, as in I don't really understand how lost they get.
posted by signal at 10:03 AM on April 14 [10 favorites]
My wife yesterday was saying how this makes me lack empathy for people without navigational skills, as in I don't really understand how lost they get.
posted by signal at 10:03 AM on April 14 [10 favorites]
One time I was navigating my way through back yards in Madison shortly after I'd been at the new apartment, but not familiar with the neighborhood.
We were on Shrooms and I was like "I just know it's 'this way'" and followed my gut and I came out directly across the street. It was all just... intuited (I'm pretty sure shortly after this I felt like I was in an Escher stairwell believing I could (if I chose) continually walk updown, so - take my belief in intuition here with a large grain of salt).
posted by symbioid at 10:07 AM on April 14 [3 favorites]
We were on Shrooms and I was like "I just know it's 'this way'" and followed my gut and I came out directly across the street. It was all just... intuited (I'm pretty sure shortly after this I felt like I was in an Escher stairwell believing I could (if I chose) continually walk updown, so - take my belief in intuition here with a large grain of salt).
posted by symbioid at 10:07 AM on April 14 [3 favorites]
I tend to use all maps in north up orientation. It helps with knowing which direction you are specifically traveling. If you need to detour for any reason, it's easy to keep heading the same direction. Maybe this is something to do with how my brain is wired up, but looking at a GPS map in first person perspective makes it impossible to know where I actually am in my mental map.
posted by dobi at 10:12 AM on April 14 [10 favorites]
posted by dobi at 10:12 AM on April 14 [10 favorites]
I am pretty good at navigating urban spaces and complicated buildings, once I develop a familiarity with them. I have a much harder time in rural or wild spaces.
posted by GenjiandProust at 10:14 AM on April 14 [2 favorites]
posted by GenjiandProust at 10:14 AM on April 14 [2 favorites]
I tend to have great navigation skills when driving or walking. Not perfect, I do take wrong turns and get lost from time to time, but I generally know what direction I'm facing relative to where I want to be and usually a pretty clear sense of distance.
But indoors, in what to me are disorienting spaces like malls (remember those?), I find keeping myself orientated nearly impossible. Last year I had to go to a conference held in Vegas, where the conference facilities were attached to a casino that in turn connected to multiple hotels, indoor atria with restaurants and shops, and so on. I found the whole thing completely disorienting and never did manage to get my bearings enough to find my way around easily. Some of the people I was with had the same difficulties that I did, but others had no problem at all remembering routes like turning right at the blackjack tables and then going up the second set of escalators versus first going to the second floor, then angling right, then dropping back down a level. I was jealous of their ability to stay orientated in that environment.
posted by Dip Flash at 10:15 AM on April 14
But indoors, in what to me are disorienting spaces like malls (remember those?), I find keeping myself orientated nearly impossible. Last year I had to go to a conference held in Vegas, where the conference facilities were attached to a casino that in turn connected to multiple hotels, indoor atria with restaurants and shops, and so on. I found the whole thing completely disorienting and never did manage to get my bearings enough to find my way around easily. Some of the people I was with had the same difficulties that I did, but others had no problem at all remembering routes like turning right at the blackjack tables and then going up the second set of escalators versus first going to the second floor, then angling right, then dropping back down a level. I was jealous of their ability to stay orientated in that environment.
posted by Dip Flash at 10:15 AM on April 14
Interesting that this article does not allude to the somewhat fraught issue of whether humans have a built-in magnetic compass.
Lots of other mammals seem to, and I have a maddeningly vague memory of an article from The New Scientist in the 90s or early 2000s reporting on a study that claimed young girls had one, but that it disappeared some time after puberty.
In any case, it’s hard to see how an internal magnetic compass could be useful or even be noticed if you happened to have one in a contemporary society in which almost all of us are putting powerful magnets right next to our heads almost all of the time.
posted by jamjam at 10:27 AM on April 14 [2 favorites]
Lots of other mammals seem to, and I have a maddeningly vague memory of an article from The New Scientist in the 90s or early 2000s reporting on a study that claimed young girls had one, but that it disappeared some time after puberty.
In any case, it’s hard to see how an internal magnetic compass could be useful or even be noticed if you happened to have one in a contemporary society in which almost all of us are putting powerful magnets right next to our heads almost all of the time.
posted by jamjam at 10:27 AM on April 14 [2 favorites]
I have strong internal navigation skills, but poor internal sense of cardinal directions beyond sunrise/sunset. I am constantly flabbergasted by how bad other people are at navigation - my partner being my most frequent point of comparison. But for example, this summer I was with a bunch of academics on a sprawling university campus that none of us had been to before (and this was international, in a place without easily accessible wifi), of a range of ages, and I quickly entered the role as guide. Every time I go on a new path/route, I'm somewhat consciously mapping what it looks like as I go - I might struggle to draw a map of where I've just walked (and I'm also not that good at giving directions, or remembering street names, or good at remembering verbal directions someone else has given me), but I can find my way back once I see what it looks like as I walk.
I guess I can see how this was mostly learned - I was definitely a "free range" child and allowed to wonder around the neighborhood and beyond at a fairly young age. I also did a lot of camping and hiking with my mom as a kid, and would also have free rein to wonder around campgrounds and adjoining trails. I vaguely recall my mom instructing me to always pay attention to whatever route I took so I could find my way back, so that's kinda an innate practice at this point. Occasionally I got lost, but always figured it out - I'd say another different between my partner is if we ever are a little confused as to where we are, he gets a little alarmed whereas I'm generally not worried. And then certainly the four years I cycled everywhere in Brooklyn/Manhattan/Queens was an extensive practice in mapping.
posted by coffeecat at 10:30 AM on April 14 [4 favorites]
I guess I can see how this was mostly learned - I was definitely a "free range" child and allowed to wonder around the neighborhood and beyond at a fairly young age. I also did a lot of camping and hiking with my mom as a kid, and would also have free rein to wonder around campgrounds and adjoining trails. I vaguely recall my mom instructing me to always pay attention to whatever route I took so I could find my way back, so that's kinda an innate practice at this point. Occasionally I got lost, but always figured it out - I'd say another different between my partner is if we ever are a little confused as to where we are, he gets a little alarmed whereas I'm generally not worried. And then certainly the four years I cycled everywhere in Brooklyn/Manhattan/Queens was an extensive practice in mapping.
posted by coffeecat at 10:30 AM on April 14 [4 favorites]
I'm going with genetics. My father had the knack, my sister has the knack, I have some of the knack. I don't judge. I've always assumed it was a knack, some people got that instead of, say, an ear for language.
posted by BWA at 10:32 AM on April 14 [6 favorites]
posted by BWA at 10:32 AM on April 14 [6 favorites]
I used to do a little mountain climbing. Our instructor told us to 'always look back at the valley' on our way up, so when you were coming down you'd know which way to go. I use this simple trick a lot in unfamiliar places.
posted by signal at 10:39 AM on April 14 [15 favorites]
posted by signal at 10:39 AM on April 14 [15 favorites]
• If you want to look up more info on the Santa Barbara Sense of Direction Scale (SBSOD) questionnaire, here's the page which includes this link to the PDF of the study "Development of a self-report measure of environmental
spatial ability".
• The article talks about studies on how well people navigate through a virtual environment. But I'm not sure if that applies to the real world. At least for me, in the real world, I think I'm an excellent navigator. But in the virtual environment of games, I have practically no sense of direction and just tend to get lost, which is probably the main reason I'm not a gamer. Maybe it means that I need actual physical movement to build a mental map of a space, although if I look up a route on a map, I usually have no problems memorizing it (by which streets and directions to turn on). And there's been some research that indicates that humans have a "Mental compass: New evidence suggests humans can sense Earth's magnetic field", so that could explain why it's easier for me in the real world than a virtual world.
posted by ShooBoo at 10:42 AM on April 14 [6 favorites]
spatial ability".
• The article talks about studies on how well people navigate through a virtual environment. But I'm not sure if that applies to the real world. At least for me, in the real world, I think I'm an excellent navigator. But in the virtual environment of games, I have practically no sense of direction and just tend to get lost, which is probably the main reason I'm not a gamer. Maybe it means that I need actual physical movement to build a mental map of a space, although if I look up a route on a map, I usually have no problems memorizing it (by which streets and directions to turn on). And there's been some research that indicates that humans have a "Mental compass: New evidence suggests humans can sense Earth's magnetic field", so that could explain why it's easier for me in the real world than a virtual world.
posted by ShooBoo at 10:42 AM on April 14 [6 favorites]
I grew up in a number of urban spaces and have fond memories of leading my family through the subways systems of Tokyo, New York, and Hong Kong and treating it like a game. I also came of age before ubiquitous GPS so often had to learn how to read a map and translate that into directions. I often still need to recheck and reorient myself on a map, but getting lost is not a big fear. When backpacking or camping in the woods, I have red/green colorblindness so my ability to discern trail or blazes is poor to middling, but I do alright with map and compass and triangulating myself against landmarks. When I used to have a commute, I would intentionally take a wrong turn and let myself find a way back without using maps just to entertain myself when a commute had gotten rote and boring.
My wife, on the other hand, struggles with navigation. She does ok with gridded streets but looking at a map, even with GPS, and translating to what she sees when facing an intersection is confusing to her. The notion of what I do with intentionally getting lost and daring myself to find my way back again gives her anxiety. I had thought that it was some issue with upbringing, but I also have seen how her father has the same challenge, as does her brother, so I'm also going with this being genetics.
posted by bl1nk at 10:50 AM on April 14 [1 favorite]
My wife, on the other hand, struggles with navigation. She does ok with gridded streets but looking at a map, even with GPS, and translating to what she sees when facing an intersection is confusing to her. The notion of what I do with intentionally getting lost and daring myself to find my way back again gives her anxiety. I had thought that it was some issue with upbringing, but I also have seen how her father has the same challenge, as does her brother, so I'm also going with this being genetics.
posted by bl1nk at 10:50 AM on April 14 [1 favorite]
Having lived in cities both with and without a grid system, I must say, they are completely different navigational experiences. Obviously a grid system is easy to navigate because it's a grid, but more importantly, the grid serves as an ever-present compass. Without a grid system, you can travel in what might seem like a straight line, but end up turned 90 degrees or more. And five-way intersections really do not mesh well with four cardinal directions.
The exam for becoming a London black cab driver is intense, and supposedly results in measurable changes in brain structure.
I wonder if there's a relationship between ability in navigation and ability in memory sports. The method of loci is incredibly powerful, yet involves little more than repurposing spatial/navigational memory to store other things.
posted by swr at 11:07 AM on April 14 [7 favorites]
The exam for becoming a London black cab driver is intense, and supposedly results in measurable changes in brain structure.
I wonder if there's a relationship between ability in navigation and ability in memory sports. The method of loci is incredibly powerful, yet involves little more than repurposing spatial/navigational memory to store other things.
posted by swr at 11:07 AM on April 14 [7 favorites]
I'd say it's a learned skill.
One that needs practice.
I've been very far away from anything in deep bush.
You use a topo map. You learn how to read it.
Use a compass and a watch.
Adjust for declination.
The watch is also a navigational instrument
Notice where the sun is. Keep track of it.
And count your paces.
These are all learned habits.
With a trail GPS . I catch myself not always counting paces now
Where before GPS it was an automatic habit.
I use UTM co- ordinates on the GPS. It's much easier to orient and keep a mental picture.
Again that's learned. So is what map datum to use.
I admit I'm always a bit puzzled by American hikers who only use their cell phone GPS.
Be basically suicidal in Northern Canada. No cell service.
posted by yyz at 11:08 AM on April 14 [11 favorites]
One that needs practice.
I've been very far away from anything in deep bush.
You use a topo map. You learn how to read it.
Use a compass and a watch.
Adjust for declination.
The watch is also a navigational instrument
Notice where the sun is. Keep track of it.
And count your paces.
These are all learned habits.
With a trail GPS . I catch myself not always counting paces now
Where before GPS it was an automatic habit.
I use UTM co- ordinates on the GPS. It's much easier to orient and keep a mental picture.
Again that's learned. So is what map datum to use.
I admit I'm always a bit puzzled by American hikers who only use their cell phone GPS.
Be basically suicidal in Northern Canada. No cell service.
posted by yyz at 11:08 AM on April 14 [11 favorites]
I am often lost. I also cannot find things on supermarket shelves, and I have trouble recognizing people. I have always thought these are related
posted by kerf at 11:18 AM on April 14 [4 favorites]
posted by kerf at 11:18 AM on April 14 [4 favorites]
>Notice where the sun is. Keep track of it.
perceiving shadow angles / shading is a biggie. plus at night knowing how to read the moon's crescent (always pointing at the sun), if there is one.
I was at Dealey Plaza in Dallas last week and could suss out the cardinal directions by how the sun was shading the building faces.
posted by torokunai at 11:52 AM on April 14 [1 favorite]
perceiving shadow angles / shading is a biggie. plus at night knowing how to read the moon's crescent (always pointing at the sun), if there is one.
I was at Dealey Plaza in Dallas last week and could suss out the cardinal directions by how the sun was shading the building faces.
posted by torokunai at 11:52 AM on April 14 [1 favorite]
I have absolutely no sense of direction.
I am 52 years old and have spent my life walking, cycling and driving in all kinds of urban and rural environments. I've only recently started using GPS devices and they are a blessing to me.
I pay very careful attention to where I am, and yet I still get turned around, and only one mistake will throw me completely off my map of where I'm supposed to be.
Here's the thing.
People are *different*
Just because you can do something, and someone else can't, doesn't mean they're just not trying hard enough, or would be able to if they just [whatever ]
posted by Zumbador at 11:57 AM on April 14 [21 favorites]
I am 52 years old and have spent my life walking, cycling and driving in all kinds of urban and rural environments. I've only recently started using GPS devices and they are a blessing to me.
I pay very careful attention to where I am, and yet I still get turned around, and only one mistake will throw me completely off my map of where I'm supposed to be.
Here's the thing.
People are *different*
Just because you can do something, and someone else can't, doesn't mean they're just not trying hard enough, or would be able to if they just [whatever ]
posted by Zumbador at 11:57 AM on April 14 [21 favorites]
I don't get lost, I practice "stunt navigation." It even has its own theme song to the tune of "I Shot the Sheriff", although I only really do the chorus.
posted by Halloween Jack at 12:07 PM on April 14 [6 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 12:07 PM on April 14 [6 favorites]
my sense of direction is stunted in a way I imagine some people struggle with dyslexia/dyscalculia
it's pronounced, and the anxiety and intense irritation I get trying to navigate is what I imagine some people feel with words/equations. it's not fun
posted by elkevelvet at 12:26 PM on April 14 [8 favorites]
it's pronounced, and the anxiety and intense irritation I get trying to navigate is what I imagine some people feel with words/equations. it's not fun
posted by elkevelvet at 12:26 PM on April 14 [8 favorites]
I'm much better at outdoors navigation. To the point that anxiety dreams for me are often about being lost in a huge building full of stairs and corridors.
Which doesn't mean I couldn't get lost outdoors, just that there's usually enough unique features+ being able to work out where you are by the sun's position that I feel able to eventually find my way somewhere.
posted by emjaybee at 12:37 PM on April 14
Which doesn't mean I couldn't get lost outdoors, just that there's usually enough unique features+ being able to work out where you are by the sun's position that I feel able to eventually find my way somewhere.
posted by emjaybee at 12:37 PM on April 14
I don't have a great sense of direction. I do think it is something that can be cultivated, to a degree. But only to a degree. I think I'm near my limit.
I also suspect that our brains struggle to orient themselves more when we are driving than when we are walking, or even taking the bus. The landscape doesn't go by as quickly and you have more attention to spare for it, as opposed to traffic. Another reason to walk or take public transit!
posted by praemunire at 12:38 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
I also suspect that our brains struggle to orient themselves more when we are driving than when we are walking, or even taking the bus. The landscape doesn't go by as quickly and you have more attention to spare for it, as opposed to traffic. Another reason to walk or take public transit!
posted by praemunire at 12:38 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
If you are confused, look to the sun. Carry a compass to help you along.
posted by kaibutsu at 12:38 PM on April 14 [16 favorites]
posted by kaibutsu at 12:38 PM on April 14 [16 favorites]
I admit I'm always a bit puzzled by American hikers who only use their cell phone GPS.
Be basically suicidal in Northern Canada. No cell service.
If you cache the map on your phone (which Google Maps can if you ask it to ahead of time) then it will geolocate you okay.
The problem with Google Maps is that it is mostly made for roads, you want a good trail map because it will show you such things as "where the trail actually is" and "this is a backcountry campsite" and so on. Google Maps often just doesn't have that information at all whether you have cell service or not. There are specific apps with trail data you can download, though.
posted by BungaDunga at 12:45 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
Be basically suicidal in Northern Canada. No cell service.
If you cache the map on your phone (which Google Maps can if you ask it to ahead of time) then it will geolocate you okay.
The problem with Google Maps is that it is mostly made for roads, you want a good trail map because it will show you such things as "where the trail actually is" and "this is a backcountry campsite" and so on. Google Maps often just doesn't have that information at all whether you have cell service or not. There are specific apps with trail data you can download, though.
posted by BungaDunga at 12:45 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
An essential component of my life was defined by Douglas Adams in the concept of Zen navigation from the Dirk Gently novels, where I can say something to the effect of "I think I'm just going to Zen navigate from here" and if my wife becomes perturbed we can simply switch to real navigation. More often, if there is time, we can just sort of see where things take us using shambolic wayfinding, which is invariably far more interesting and honestly generally gets us back home in unexpected ways. A strangely valuable practice.
posted by eschatfische at 12:52 PM on April 14 [12 favorites]
posted by eschatfische at 12:52 PM on April 14 [12 favorites]
Many years ago, when I was in a band with other early-20s folk, we would drive to a strange town and try to find whatever venue we were supposed to be playing in. The drummer almost always drove and he didn't like maps. He would just follow his nose. We used to call this "Jah guidance". It mostly worked.
I myself have a pretty good sense of direction and build up a mental map of new places fast. Perhaps not coincidentally, I enjoy exploring new cities on foot and just wandering around. I know I'll find my way back. But if I have travelled to the northern hemisphere, for a few days my sense of direction is always off, probably I'm guessing because the the sun is in the wrong place.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 1:07 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
I myself have a pretty good sense of direction and build up a mental map of new places fast. Perhaps not coincidentally, I enjoy exploring new cities on foot and just wandering around. I know I'll find my way back. But if I have travelled to the northern hemisphere, for a few days my sense of direction is always off, probably I'm guessing because the the sun is in the wrong place.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 1:07 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
The TV aerials in London all point toward Crystal Palace, which is nearly always southeast of me. Satellite dishes used to point due south.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 1:24 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 1:24 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
knowing how to read the moon's crescent (always pointing at the sun), if there is one.
Woah, this was an ‘I was today years old…’ moment for me. It makes total sense though!
posted by TwoWordReview at 1:29 PM on April 14 [6 favorites]
Woah, this was an ‘I was today years old…’ moment for me. It makes total sense though!
posted by TwoWordReview at 1:29 PM on April 14 [6 favorites]
I used to have a great sense of direction and ability to form a mental map of my surroundings, until fairly recently. Then I started to have strange “lapses” like having no memory of where I’d parked, or no idea whether to make a right or left turn to get somewhere I’d been before.
Eventually, it turned out that I have a brain tumor that is specifically affecting these intuitive spatial reasoning abilities that allow one to e.g. freely shift between a real or imagined first-person view and an overall mental map of space and how things connect. I can still navigate to some degree by remembering sequences of waypoints.
So the difference between these two kinds of spatial memory is extremely vivid for me every day.
posted by mubba at 1:36 PM on April 14 [20 favorites]
Eventually, it turned out that I have a brain tumor that is specifically affecting these intuitive spatial reasoning abilities that allow one to e.g. freely shift between a real or imagined first-person view and an overall mental map of space and how things connect. I can still navigate to some degree by remembering sequences of waypoints.
So the difference between these two kinds of spatial memory is extremely vivid for me every day.
posted by mubba at 1:36 PM on April 14 [20 favorites]
Experts also suggest that struggling navigators like Uttal could try paying closer attention to compass directions or prominent landmarks as a way to integrate their movements into a mental map.
Some people find it odd that I set my map/GPS apps so that up is always north, rather than constantly turning the map to match my own directional perspective. But I like having it in "up is north" mode because it lets me always know where I am in the grand scheme of things, rather than what upcoming lefts and rights I need to make.
I have average navigational ability.
posted by AlSweigart at 1:40 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]
Some people find it odd that I set my map/GPS apps so that up is always north, rather than constantly turning the map to match my own directional perspective. But I like having it in "up is north" mode because it lets me always know where I am in the grand scheme of things, rather than what upcoming lefts and rights I need to make.
I have average navigational ability.
posted by AlSweigart at 1:40 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]
I'm bad at navigation. I also tend to easily get confused when given choreography-type directions (raise your left foot, wave your right hand...) and I have pretty strong visual aphantasia, and wonder if those things are related. Also, ADHD-ish symptoms where even if I know where I'm going, if I'm having a conversation or thinking about something, I will miss turns or just drive somewhere else on autopilot.
I've been driving since 1989 and playing video/computer games since 1977, so it's not like I've never seen a map before... in fact I even kind of enjoy just looking at maps sometimes. And yet my brain still kind of stalls for a couple of seconds when I try to remember (with north at the top) whether west is left or right. Trying to navigate by the sun is even worse because I have to think about which way it goes, and it gets worst if I'm already flustered.
GPS didn't ruin my sense of direction, I was always hopeless. My dad still laughs about the time I talked about "driving north on Manatee Avenue" which runs east-west.
posted by Foosnark at 1:57 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
I've been driving since 1989 and playing video/computer games since 1977, so it's not like I've never seen a map before... in fact I even kind of enjoy just looking at maps sometimes. And yet my brain still kind of stalls for a couple of seconds when I try to remember (with north at the top) whether west is left or right. Trying to navigate by the sun is even worse because I have to think about which way it goes, and it gets worst if I'm already flustered.
GPS didn't ruin my sense of direction, I was always hopeless. My dad still laughs about the time I talked about "driving north on Manatee Avenue" which runs east-west.
posted by Foosnark at 1:57 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
My folks taught me to read a map, notice landmarks, orient myself with the sun, read signs, ask for help, and best of all, not to be be afraid of getting lost, because it's not the worst thing in life, and you can get un-lost. A lifetime of experience getting around made me a pretty good navigator. I tried teaching all those things to my kids. One of them wouldn't listen, and just depends on GPS. That failed her in the deepest depth of the East Tennessee mountains once when the signal just ended, and she was terrified of asking strangers for help. I don't think she's learned her lesson yet.
posted by Miss Cellania at 2:35 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
posted by Miss Cellania at 2:35 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
I'm not bad at navigation but my wife is terrible - she can come out of the house and turn the wrong way to go somewhere she's been many times before.
She's also very dyslexic, and we definitely think the two are related.
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 2:56 PM on April 14
She's also very dyslexic, and we definitely think the two are related.
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 2:56 PM on April 14
How many of you "good at navigation" people have tried it in the opposite (north/south) hemisphere?
Having lived for many years in the Southern hemisphere, I always had a good sense of direction. On my first trip to the Northern hemisphere, I found my previous directional skill was hopeless.
Having now had more Northern hemisphere experience, I'm OK there as well, but it did take a while.
posted by HiroProtagonist at 3:22 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]
Having lived for many years in the Southern hemisphere, I always had a good sense of direction. On my first trip to the Northern hemisphere, I found my previous directional skill was hopeless.
Having now had more Northern hemisphere experience, I'm OK there as well, but it did take a while.
posted by HiroProtagonist at 3:22 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]
'always look back at the valley' on our way up, so when you were coming down you'd know which way to go.
This is a useful skill to learn. Here in New Zealand we have large areas of temperate evergreen rainforest, and it's a sadly too common event for someone to leave a track [maybe to take a photograph or a call of nature] and get disoriented and become lost - after having initially moved only a few meters off the track. Sometimes their bodies are only found months later.
When in dense forest, looking behind you when you leave a marked track can be lifesaving (especially if your sense of direction is compromised because you're from a different hemisphere).
posted by HiroProtagonist at 3:32 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
This is a useful skill to learn. Here in New Zealand we have large areas of temperate evergreen rainforest, and it's a sadly too common event for someone to leave a track [maybe to take a photograph or a call of nature] and get disoriented and become lost - after having initially moved only a few meters off the track. Sometimes their bodies are only found months later.
When in dense forest, looking behind you when you leave a marked track can be lifesaving (especially if your sense of direction is compromised because you're from a different hemisphere).
posted by HiroProtagonist at 3:32 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
How many of you "good at navigation" people have tried it in the opposite (north/south) hemisphere?
For me it was really disorientating for a while and then I adjusted. I had to be really conscious about things like "I'll sit here so the tree's shadow will move over me" though, since I'd get it backwards and get no shadow.
posted by Dip Flash at 3:38 PM on April 14
For me it was really disorientating for a while and then I adjusted. I had to be really conscious about things like "I'll sit here so the tree's shadow will move over me" though, since I'd get it backwards and get no shadow.
posted by Dip Flash at 3:38 PM on April 14
kerf:
HiroProtagonist:
Also, I grew up near the equator, so I don't know if that calibrated my sensitivity to the earth's magnetic field or whatever differently.
posted by bl1nk at 4:14 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
I am often lost. I also cannot find things on supermarket shelves, and I have trouble recognizing people. I have always thought these are relatedmy wife who, as I mentioned, has inherited an inability to navigate also has face blindness. As a teacher, she does go through some specific exercises to remember the faces of her students; but she struggles with remembering friends of friends that we've met at parties, or actors that she's seen before in a movie. So additional data point for you on how these might be related.
HiroProtagonist:
How many of you "good at navigation" people have tried it in the opposite (north/south) hemisphere?I live in North America, but when I visited Melbourne, Australia, I got around fine. The only thing that threw me was, when biking on streets, if there were no lane markings, I would naturally gravitate to the right side, rather than the left, but I also would do that when driving in the UK. I'd be in the correct lane if there was a solid or dashed line as I was making a turn, but something about it just being a blank lane just triggered this natural inclination to go into the "wrong for there" side of the street.
Also, I grew up near the equator, so I don't know if that calibrated my sensitivity to the earth's magnetic field or whatever differently.
posted by bl1nk at 4:14 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
I'm not great on directions, probably just average at best, but I generally just do not care if I get lost. If I'm with someone who knows where we are or how to find out, I let them take care of spatial stuff. If I'm alone, I just ask directions of the next person I walk past. I almost never carry a phone with me, so I'm not using GPS.
posted by pracowity at 4:17 PM on April 14
posted by pracowity at 4:17 PM on April 14
I think it's mostly a learned skill, though I can't explain my brother's ridiculously bad sense of direction. I remember getting a sense of distance and direction, how much walking it takes to cover a mile, etc. by simply exploring.
I remember being baffled by adult leaders who would lead in what I thought were clearly wrong directions, and just assuming they had something in mind, only to find they didn't know where they were going.
I'm finding maps via phone to be tremendously unsatisfying, which really irks me, as paper maps become increasingly rare. Even on a large desktop monitor, digital maps simply don't offer better sense of proportion or detail than paper. I have a feeling this will not help people in general with navigation skills.
posted by 2N2222 at 4:36 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
I remember being baffled by adult leaders who would lead in what I thought were clearly wrong directions, and just assuming they had something in mind, only to find they didn't know where they were going.
I'm finding maps via phone to be tremendously unsatisfying, which really irks me, as paper maps become increasingly rare. Even on a large desktop monitor, digital maps simply don't offer better sense of proportion or detail than paper. I have a feeling this will not help people in general with navigation skills.
posted by 2N2222 at 4:36 PM on April 14 [4 favorites]
Add me as another person with face blindness and difficulties navigating. This article cites research about the relationship between the two (full article available here). Interestingly, the article is about an experiment they did with a woman who has face blindness: they used virtual reality to help her learn to navigate better, and it seems to have worked. So maybe there’s hope for all of us!
My grandmother and aunt also had face blindness and difficulties with navigation, so I have often wondered about the genetic component.
Something I found interesting in the article was the distinction they made between route following and survey knowledge. If I follow a route multiple times, I can find my way okay. But I don’t tend to have very good mental maps, even of places I’ve lived a long time.
For example, I can find my way around pretty well in familiar neighbourhoods in and around Vancouver, a place I lived for a long time. And I know what a map of Vancouver looks like. But if I am actually *in* Vancouver standing on the street, it’s hard for me to picture myself on that map when I’m looking around. Like I find it difficult to mesh that mental map picture with what I see around me in real life, if that makes any sense.
BUT, if I picture myself floating above where I am on the street and looking down on myself and the street I’m on, THEN I can figure it out. Is that normal? Is that what everyone does? I don’t know.
And if I’m in an unfamiliar city, then all bets are off.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 4:49 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
My grandmother and aunt also had face blindness and difficulties with navigation, so I have often wondered about the genetic component.
Something I found interesting in the article was the distinction they made between route following and survey knowledge. If I follow a route multiple times, I can find my way okay. But I don’t tend to have very good mental maps, even of places I’ve lived a long time.
For example, I can find my way around pretty well in familiar neighbourhoods in and around Vancouver, a place I lived for a long time. And I know what a map of Vancouver looks like. But if I am actually *in* Vancouver standing on the street, it’s hard for me to picture myself on that map when I’m looking around. Like I find it difficult to mesh that mental map picture with what I see around me in real life, if that makes any sense.
BUT, if I picture myself floating above where I am on the street and looking down on myself and the street I’m on, THEN I can figure it out. Is that normal? Is that what everyone does? I don’t know.
And if I’m in an unfamiliar city, then all bets are off.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 4:49 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
I admit I'm always a bit puzzled by American hikers who only use their cell phone GPS.
Be basically suicidal in Northern Canada. No cell service.
GPS doesn't use cell signal, though?
posted by panama joe at 4:55 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]
Be basically suicidal in Northern Canada. No cell service.
GPS doesn't use cell signal, though?
posted by panama joe at 4:55 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]
Eventually, it turned out that I have a brain tumor that is specifically affecting these intuitive spatial reasoning abilities that allow one to e.g. freely shift between a real or imagined first-person view and an overall mental map of space and how things connect. I can still navigate to some degree by remembering sequences of waypoints.
I was born like this. I can't imagine a first-person view OR a map, ever. Full aphantasia and mostly face-blind.
My navigation is strictly by lists of waypoints, which leads to a weird subway-map optimization where I judge distance by number of waypoints rather than by actual distance. So sometimes I think a further-away place is easier to get to just because I only have to make three turns. Also sometimes I'm shocked to find out that two places are right next to each other because I've learned different waypoints to get to each one.
My wife used to have migraines that would cause "the map in her head" to disappear. That was how I found out other people have maps in their heads in the first place.
I live nowhere near the ocean but weirdly, when I'm in California or Florida, I can intuitively tell which direction the ocean is about 90% of the time, which helps me orient myself. I don't know if it's an instinct or just observing something like uphill/downhill landscapes.
posted by mmoncur at 5:23 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]
I was born like this. I can't imagine a first-person view OR a map, ever. Full aphantasia and mostly face-blind.
My navigation is strictly by lists of waypoints, which leads to a weird subway-map optimization where I judge distance by number of waypoints rather than by actual distance. So sometimes I think a further-away place is easier to get to just because I only have to make three turns. Also sometimes I'm shocked to find out that two places are right next to each other because I've learned different waypoints to get to each one.
My wife used to have migraines that would cause "the map in her head" to disappear. That was how I found out other people have maps in their heads in the first place.
I live nowhere near the ocean but weirdly, when I'm in California or Florida, I can intuitively tell which direction the ocean is about 90% of the time, which helps me orient myself. I don't know if it's an instinct or just observing something like uphill/downhill landscapes.
posted by mmoncur at 5:23 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]
I'm face blind, I'm not terrible at navigation in that if I drive a route once or twice I'm likely to be able to do it again. I can do the Chicago grid system great, but I also drove the city for field work for years. But if I walk indoors and I will never ever be able to tell you what direction anything is ever. I get lost indoors easily and just spend far too long wondering around trying to get back to a room.
I work in a building with elevators that are on both sides of the corridor and it doesn't matter how long I work there I cannot tell on the elevator which way I will need to go when I get off.
posted by AlexiaSky at 5:27 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
I work in a building with elevators that are on both sides of the corridor and it doesn't matter how long I work there I cannot tell on the elevator which way I will need to go when I get off.
posted by AlexiaSky at 5:27 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
The way mental mapping is processed in the brain is completely and totally bizarre. Anyone who thinks “well it’s just x” should read ‘All of a sudden my world would flip’: the woman who is permanently lost and be very, very glad that their brain works the way it does.
If you’ve never experienced this, I don’t know if I can describe it to you. But is the exact kind of visceral reaction most horror media can only dream of. The initial response is “I have no idea where I am.” It’s completely unrecognizable. I don’t mean in a blurry “guhhh where am I?” hangover kind of way. I mean a clear, lucid, I am looking at a location that I have never been in before. Then you start to see the details, the shape of the doorway, the familiar shadows, and you realize it’s supposed to be your bedroom, your hallway, your bathroom.
And you also know, right down to your bones, that it absolutely fucking is not. “Mirror dimension” doesn’t describe it; the way your face looks wrong in selfies vs the mirror isn’t even in the same realm; even walking into a room where someone has flipped all of the furniture (which happened to me just the other week in a room at work for unknown reasons, right down to a pair of markers set next to a tissue box) evokes an array of responses, but I cannot emphasize enough that this is an utterly different kind of bizarre. That everything is on the wrong side; that your head is turned to the right and you are seeing what should be on your left.
It only lasts for a few minutes; eventually, the visualspatial map flips back. I have never had lasting disorientation like the woman in the article; I have also never tried to stand up or move around while it’s happening. But it’s abundantly clear to me that our concept of a mental map is so much stranger and more complicated than we can understand.
I also have garbage navigational skills and can’t read a map to save my life. This despite growing up as a child frequently turned outside to wander around the neighborhood unsupervised. I have essentially a slideshow of snapshots; not even really landmarks. I can tell if we are on the right street by the way the houses look (and how they look in relation to each other) even if none of them are particularly distinct, and when trying to provide directions I have to… this isn’t really what’s happening, but basically imagine zooming in on signs and such to figure out what the thing I’m picturing is. I’m not like “oh, turn right by the McDonald’s,” I have a picture of the entire street from a particular angle, and since I can’t just beam that image into someone’s brain I have to look around the picture until I find something that I could easily describe for them to recognize and I go “ah, it’s by the McDonald’s, turn right there.” This is the same for internal spaces as external ones.
Which would suggest to me I have no actual mental map. Except for the fact that I clearly fucking do and sometimes, for no apparent reason (well—presumably inner ear related) it sends me straight to the Twilight Zone.
posted by brook horse at 5:29 PM on April 14 [23 favorites]
In 1952, when she was a child, Sharon was playing in the front garden. She was blindfolded while her friends ran around her, laughing, trying not to be caught in a game of blind man’s buff. Sharon grabbed hold of someone’s sleeve and whipped off the scarf that covered her eyes. “You’re it!” she shouted.This phenomenon happens to me, but exclusively when I wake up in the middle of the night and (usually after sitting up) turn my head. I am awake and visually processing every detail of my side table, my bedroom, the open door to the bathroom partially lit by the kitchen light. And for about 3-5 minutes, my mental map has flipped.
Then she blinked and looked around her. She panicked. The house and the street looked different. She had no idea where she was. Sharon ran into the back garden and discovered her mother sitting in a lawn chair.
“What are you doing here?” Sharon asked. “Whose back yard is this? Where am I?”
Her mother looked at her, puzzled. “What’s wrong with you?” she asked her daughter. “This is our house!”
Her mum pointed a finger at Sharon, aged five: ‘Don’t tell anyone about this. They’ll say you’re a witch and burn you’
Sharon told her mother that everything around her looked different. Her mother looked irritated. Sharon didn’t understand: why wasn’t her mother helping her?
“I don’t know where this place is, it all looks wrong,” she said. “I’m so confused.”
Her mum looked her in the eye, and pointed a finger at her face.
“Don’t ever tell anybody about this,” she said. “Because they’ll say you’re a witch and burn you.”
“I can remember that moment as if it were yesterday,” Sharon says, more than 60 years later. “I was five years old.”
Sharon woke up the next morning knowing that something weird had happened again. It was as though her walls had moved in her sleep. She was in her bedroom but things didn’t look as if they were in the right place. Her door was on the wrong side. “I knew it had to be my bedroom,” she says, “and bits of the room were familiar, but it was all wrong at the same time. Nothing was where I thought it should be.”
Sharon’s disorientation began to occur more frequently, until it became constant. It made finding her way around her neighbourhood and her school impossible. She never mentioned her problem to anyone. Instead, she used her sense of humour and intelligence to complete her education, make friends and get married, without anyone ever knowing she was almost permanently lost.
If you’ve never experienced this, I don’t know if I can describe it to you. But is the exact kind of visceral reaction most horror media can only dream of. The initial response is “I have no idea where I am.” It’s completely unrecognizable. I don’t mean in a blurry “guhhh where am I?” hangover kind of way. I mean a clear, lucid, I am looking at a location that I have never been in before. Then you start to see the details, the shape of the doorway, the familiar shadows, and you realize it’s supposed to be your bedroom, your hallway, your bathroom.
And you also know, right down to your bones, that it absolutely fucking is not. “Mirror dimension” doesn’t describe it; the way your face looks wrong in selfies vs the mirror isn’t even in the same realm; even walking into a room where someone has flipped all of the furniture (which happened to me just the other week in a room at work for unknown reasons, right down to a pair of markers set next to a tissue box) evokes an array of responses, but I cannot emphasize enough that this is an utterly different kind of bizarre. That everything is on the wrong side; that your head is turned to the right and you are seeing what should be on your left.
It only lasts for a few minutes; eventually, the visualspatial map flips back. I have never had lasting disorientation like the woman in the article; I have also never tried to stand up or move around while it’s happening. But it’s abundantly clear to me that our concept of a mental map is so much stranger and more complicated than we can understand.
I also have garbage navigational skills and can’t read a map to save my life. This despite growing up as a child frequently turned outside to wander around the neighborhood unsupervised. I have essentially a slideshow of snapshots; not even really landmarks. I can tell if we are on the right street by the way the houses look (and how they look in relation to each other) even if none of them are particularly distinct, and when trying to provide directions I have to… this isn’t really what’s happening, but basically imagine zooming in on signs and such to figure out what the thing I’m picturing is. I’m not like “oh, turn right by the McDonald’s,” I have a picture of the entire street from a particular angle, and since I can’t just beam that image into someone’s brain I have to look around the picture until I find something that I could easily describe for them to recognize and I go “ah, it’s by the McDonald’s, turn right there.” This is the same for internal spaces as external ones.
Which would suggest to me I have no actual mental map. Except for the fact that I clearly fucking do and sometimes, for no apparent reason (well—presumably inner ear related) it sends me straight to the Twilight Zone.
posted by brook horse at 5:29 PM on April 14 [23 favorites]
Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why by Laurence Gonzales is interesting and good.
posted by neuron at 5:41 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
posted by neuron at 5:41 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
GPS doesn't use cell signal, though?
Where I go there is no cell coverage
It's not just a dead spot.
In the cities I use Android Auto and I like it
My experience with cell phone GPS is limited to cities
My trail GPS, and compass will kinda work in the city but Android Auto or cell phone is way better
GPS uses satellite signals.
The phone use GPS signals. but the signal needs context,
Out of cell range you can lose that context .
There are ways , as BungaDunga pointed out, cache the maps etc.
I'm not that familiar with it,
But there is a huge difference between a trail GPS and a cell phone.
Certain things the cell phone GPS is better at,
The points of interest gas stations , restaurants, donut stores etc.
But a trail GPS has weeks of better battery life.
An extra set I'm good for a month.
Far more rugged , far more waterproof
I can drop it into a creek
I've swam with one
Far more reliable.
They'll survive when a cell phone won't.
And I do not require digital maps.
( i have them, but I don't need them )
But I guess what got me, was reading about thru hikers on the PCT , and how they had zero backup.
Not even a compass.
When the cellphone died , they had problems.
They were lucky they had a trail.
I would not set foot into the bush without a compass and map.
Yet many thru hikers seemed to do that , just relying on their cell phone
But I go where there no trails, no signs , no cell signals, nothing
No roads , No McDonalds , no gas stations
Hundreds of miles of nothing.
A mistake there is very bad news.
posted by yyz at 5:56 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
Where I go there is no cell coverage
It's not just a dead spot.
In the cities I use Android Auto and I like it
My experience with cell phone GPS is limited to cities
My trail GPS, and compass will kinda work in the city but Android Auto or cell phone is way better
GPS uses satellite signals.
The phone use GPS signals. but the signal needs context,
Out of cell range you can lose that context .
There are ways , as BungaDunga pointed out, cache the maps etc.
I'm not that familiar with it,
But there is a huge difference between a trail GPS and a cell phone.
Certain things the cell phone GPS is better at,
The points of interest gas stations , restaurants, donut stores etc.
But a trail GPS has weeks of better battery life.
An extra set I'm good for a month.
Far more rugged , far more waterproof
I can drop it into a creek
I've swam with one
Far more reliable.
They'll survive when a cell phone won't.
And I do not require digital maps.
( i have them, but I don't need them )
But I guess what got me, was reading about thru hikers on the PCT , and how they had zero backup.
Not even a compass.
When the cellphone died , they had problems.
They were lucky they had a trail.
I would not set foot into the bush without a compass and map.
Yet many thru hikers seemed to do that , just relying on their cell phone
But I go where there no trails, no signs , no cell signals, nothing
No roads , No McDonalds , no gas stations
Hundreds of miles of nothing.
A mistake there is very bad news.
posted by yyz at 5:56 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
Whenever I've visited Florida I've always felt a little unsettled by the lack of distant landmarks. I think it must be very easy to become lost there (on the other hand, you can usually see the sun, which means you should always know roughly where the cardinal directions are.)
posted by surlyben at 6:00 PM on April 14
posted by surlyben at 6:00 PM on April 14
But I guess what got me, was reading about thru hikers on the PCT , and how they had zero backup.
Not even a compass.
I hiked the PCT with just a cell phone.
(Actually, cell phone, and an inreach, and a powerbank, and I did have a tiny compass) Typically cell phone users are also using apps with offline maps, and the GPS works fine, so there is no need to have signal. The PCT is very well marked along its entire length and during thruhiker season there will be someone along in 15 minutes or so who is also hiking the PCT, so it's not at all typical in terms of how screwed you are if your cell phone fails. My phone partially failed one time, when I couldn't unlock it due to moisture during a hail storm, but that just meant I couldn't use the GPS to pinpoint my location. I never lost the trail, and paper maps wouldn't have given me my exact location either. I usually had an image in my head of at least that day's hiking and a general idea of the lay of the land as well.
When I hike other (less traveled, less well marked) trails I have a map and a real compass in addition to the cell phone and apps that are my primary navigation method, because it seems irresponsible not to. If I had hiked the PCT in a snow year, I would have had them in the snowy areas. Hiking in Montana, Idaho, and Washington with no cell coverage for days, I might temporarily lose GPS-based location on my phone in deep valleys with lots of large trees when I am moving and the phone is in low power mode, but that happens with any GPS device.
posted by surlyben at 6:37 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
Not even a compass.
I hiked the PCT with just a cell phone.
(Actually, cell phone, and an inreach, and a powerbank, and I did have a tiny compass) Typically cell phone users are also using apps with offline maps, and the GPS works fine, so there is no need to have signal. The PCT is very well marked along its entire length and during thruhiker season there will be someone along in 15 minutes or so who is also hiking the PCT, so it's not at all typical in terms of how screwed you are if your cell phone fails. My phone partially failed one time, when I couldn't unlock it due to moisture during a hail storm, but that just meant I couldn't use the GPS to pinpoint my location. I never lost the trail, and paper maps wouldn't have given me my exact location either. I usually had an image in my head of at least that day's hiking and a general idea of the lay of the land as well.
When I hike other (less traveled, less well marked) trails I have a map and a real compass in addition to the cell phone and apps that are my primary navigation method, because it seems irresponsible not to. If I had hiked the PCT in a snow year, I would have had them in the snowy areas. Hiking in Montana, Idaho, and Washington with no cell coverage for days, I might temporarily lose GPS-based location on my phone in deep valleys with lots of large trees when I am moving and the phone is in low power mode, but that happens with any GPS device.
posted by surlyben at 6:37 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
I'm generally pretty good at navigating and can find my way around OK as long as I have an idea of the layout of the streets around me. I do tend to use the GPS in my car a lot, just because it takes away one chore from driving, but I sometimes don't follow the route because I can see there's a better way. Car-based GPS systems are terrible in big cities with lots of tall buildings and often themselves get 'lost' and I can always detect when the car system is lost and just 'follow my nose' to get back on track.
As a kid, I roamed the neighborhood and beyond on foot and on bike pretty much all the time. Never once had a map available and this was way (way!) before GPS, so I guess I learned to be unconsciously aware of where I am and where I'm heading.
I can say something to the effect of "I think I'm just going to Zen navigate from here" and if my wife becomes perturbed we can simply switch to real navigation.
If I'm not under any time pressure, I really like to 'explore alternative routes' when travelling, to see what interesting things might be just off my usual route or the logical quickest route. This drives my wife crazy - perturbed doesn't even come close. She used to spend a lot of time driving between appointments for her job and is slightly obsessed with traveling everywhere by the shortest route, so gets agitated when I amble along randomly, pulling out her phone and pointing out to me the route I 'should' be taking.
I don't know if the two things are related, but she both has trouble identifying where other places are in relation to where she is or (eg) pointing to North and is convinced that Route A is much quicker than Route B even though we've driven both many times and it's clearly not quicker under any circumstances. These things are what most of our conversations are about when driving. That and how useless the GPS system in my car is compared to Google Maps (she now accepts it has some uses, such as navigation where there's no phone signal). Which is somewhat true - it's now five years since it was updated and I've just ordered an aftermarket head unit that costs less than the price of updating the factory GPS.
How many of you "good at navigation" people have tried it in the opposite (north/south) hemisphere?
I've spent all my life living in the southern, but had no trouble navigating (including while driving on the wrong side of the road from the wrong side of the car) during our holiday in Hawaii.
GPS doesn't use cell signal, though?
When there's no phone signal, GPS will show you exactly where you are, but the phone can't download the information to show you the map, so you just look like you're in the middle of a vast empty space. Which, on a broader scale, is true.
posted by dg at 6:39 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
As a kid, I roamed the neighborhood and beyond on foot and on bike pretty much all the time. Never once had a map available and this was way (way!) before GPS, so I guess I learned to be unconsciously aware of where I am and where I'm heading.
I can say something to the effect of "I think I'm just going to Zen navigate from here" and if my wife becomes perturbed we can simply switch to real navigation.
If I'm not under any time pressure, I really like to 'explore alternative routes' when travelling, to see what interesting things might be just off my usual route or the logical quickest route. This drives my wife crazy - perturbed doesn't even come close. She used to spend a lot of time driving between appointments for her job and is slightly obsessed with traveling everywhere by the shortest route, so gets agitated when I amble along randomly, pulling out her phone and pointing out to me the route I 'should' be taking.
I don't know if the two things are related, but she both has trouble identifying where other places are in relation to where she is or (eg) pointing to North and is convinced that Route A is much quicker than Route B even though we've driven both many times and it's clearly not quicker under any circumstances. These things are what most of our conversations are about when driving. That and how useless the GPS system in my car is compared to Google Maps (she now accepts it has some uses, such as navigation where there's no phone signal). Which is somewhat true - it's now five years since it was updated and I've just ordered an aftermarket head unit that costs less than the price of updating the factory GPS.
How many of you "good at navigation" people have tried it in the opposite (north/south) hemisphere?
I've spent all my life living in the southern, but had no trouble navigating (including while driving on the wrong side of the road from the wrong side of the car) during our holiday in Hawaii.
GPS doesn't use cell signal, though?
When there's no phone signal, GPS will show you exactly where you are, but the phone can't download the information to show you the map, so you just look like you're in the middle of a vast empty space. Which, on a broader scale, is true.
posted by dg at 6:39 PM on April 14 [2 favorites]
- I learned like yyz
- my experience is that I learned it being a trail guide - a developed skill.
- not saying all brains are the same!
- +1 deep survival. also surviving the extremes.
- put me in a mall and i'm fucked, I don't capture those landmarks second nature.
- come to think of it, growing up I did almost all the street navigation for my family on old school vacation-style road trips. and in city traffic. paper maps & road atlases. i'm certain that conditioned me to internalize landmarks and sequences of directions.
posted by j_curiouser at 6:43 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
- my experience is that I learned it being a trail guide - a developed skill.
- not saying all brains are the same!
- +1 deep survival. also surviving the extremes.
- put me in a mall and i'm fucked, I don't capture those landmarks second nature.
- come to think of it, growing up I did almost all the street navigation for my family on old school vacation-style road trips. and in city traffic. paper maps & road atlases. i'm certain that conditioned me to internalize landmarks and sequences of directions.
posted by j_curiouser at 6:43 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
I have a very good sense of direction, which includes being able to orient myself to north, creating mental maps, and remembering landmarks for finding places years after a single visit. I think some of that is upbringing, but mostly there's something internal about how my brain processes that lends itself well to spacial thinking. (That said, my ability to recognize faces and my sense of smell are terrible.)
One thing I find fascinating is that both I and a good friend who also has a good sense of direction have had a shared experience of feeling like North is in the exact opposite direction while in Japan. I can mentally envision the map, watch the sun and shadows, and something still makes it feel like North is South instead. I'm from North America, so it's not the N/S hemisphere distinction. I don't know enough about the magnet orientation idea to say if there's anything related to that there, or if it's something else about the feel of the place that does it. But it's very striking and has persisted across two decades of various visits, to the degree that I just mentally account for it orienting as N=S while there. To further add to the mystery, I did not experience this feeling when visiting Australia.
posted by past unusual at 7:12 PM on April 14
One thing I find fascinating is that both I and a good friend who also has a good sense of direction have had a shared experience of feeling like North is in the exact opposite direction while in Japan. I can mentally envision the map, watch the sun and shadows, and something still makes it feel like North is South instead. I'm from North America, so it's not the N/S hemisphere distinction. I don't know enough about the magnet orientation idea to say if there's anything related to that there, or if it's something else about the feel of the place that does it. But it's very striking and has persisted across two decades of various visits, to the degree that I just mentally account for it orienting as N=S while there. To further add to the mystery, I did not experience this feeling when visiting Australia.
posted by past unusual at 7:12 PM on April 14
It makes a lot of sense to me if navigational skills are learned, and as a teacher at a tech university, it makes me feel optimistic. I don't judge students who can't find their way, but I find it empowering to know that they can learn it.
What I also like about the article is that their findings show there is no difference between men and women. Specially when I was younger, I struggled with men trying to tell me where I was, assuming I didn't know already just because of my gender. It makes total evolutionary sense that there can't be a difference -- how could women have survived back in the day without knowing where they were?
My dad was in the army, and when I was a child, we had a complicated relationship. But one thing that was never complicated was our shared love of nature and maps. His dad had been some sort of leader in the orienteering movement, and we'd go out to a sort of club where they had taken care of my dad after his father died during WW2. There, we would climb trees and explore the forest with a map and a compass. For years, when I moved to an other country with my mother and her new husband, we wouldn't see each other much, and he would send me maps of where I was so I could explore. I still have one of them.
The rest of my family picked up on my map skills, and I have fond memories of sitting next to my gran in her old Volvo, navigating through the countryside. So I got a lot of practice, both hiking and driving. To begin with, I wasn't as good at cities, but I've learnt that. I almost always know my cardinal directions and surprisingly, it has made no difference when I have been in the Southern Hemisphere.
A couple of years before my father died, we went together on a holiday with friends. This was in the early days of car GPS, and one of his far richer friends had one and was very proud of it. My dad's proudest moment was when they got lost on a trip into the countryside and I navigated us safely back to our rented villa with our paper map.
I like getting lost, probably because I am never really lost. Just today, I went to a district I don't know well, to visit a museum, and on the way home, I turned off the main route. Driving around, listening to the radio and seeing new places is a treat. Eventually I felt tired and drove home. I wasn't really lost at all.
posted by mumimor at 7:52 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]
What I also like about the article is that their findings show there is no difference between men and women. Specially when I was younger, I struggled with men trying to tell me where I was, assuming I didn't know already just because of my gender. It makes total evolutionary sense that there can't be a difference -- how could women have survived back in the day without knowing where they were?
My dad was in the army, and when I was a child, we had a complicated relationship. But one thing that was never complicated was our shared love of nature and maps. His dad had been some sort of leader in the orienteering movement, and we'd go out to a sort of club where they had taken care of my dad after his father died during WW2. There, we would climb trees and explore the forest with a map and a compass. For years, when I moved to an other country with my mother and her new husband, we wouldn't see each other much, and he would send me maps of where I was so I could explore. I still have one of them.
The rest of my family picked up on my map skills, and I have fond memories of sitting next to my gran in her old Volvo, navigating through the countryside. So I got a lot of practice, both hiking and driving. To begin with, I wasn't as good at cities, but I've learnt that. I almost always know my cardinal directions and surprisingly, it has made no difference when I have been in the Southern Hemisphere.
A couple of years before my father died, we went together on a holiday with friends. This was in the early days of car GPS, and one of his far richer friends had one and was very proud of it. My dad's proudest moment was when they got lost on a trip into the countryside and I navigated us safely back to our rented villa with our paper map.
I like getting lost, probably because I am never really lost. Just today, I went to a district I don't know well, to visit a museum, and on the way home, I turned off the main route. Driving around, listening to the radio and seeing new places is a treat. Eventually I felt tired and drove home. I wasn't really lost at all.
posted by mumimor at 7:52 PM on April 14 [5 favorites]
Another navigator who doesn't get lost. No idea why. My dad has it too to a lesser degree now that he's getting older. My brother doesn't have it. My mom could get lost in a closet. I was willingly used and abused by friends parents when we went on road trips or sports camps. I never understood how people can't read maps.
I've seen several comments about it ITT, and now I'm less freaked about the cardinal direction thing. It worked in Europe, and it worked in Asia. I haven't been in the southern hemisphere, but now I want to go.
posted by Sphinx at 8:02 PM on April 14
I've seen several comments about it ITT, and now I'm less freaked about the cardinal direction thing. It worked in Europe, and it worked in Asia. I haven't been in the southern hemisphere, but now I want to go.
posted by Sphinx at 8:02 PM on April 14
a contemporary society in which almost all of us are putting powerful magnets right next to our heads almost all of the time
Are we? What magnets?
posted by Dysk at 8:04 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
Are we? What magnets?
posted by Dysk at 8:04 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
Interesting article. I'm an ok navigator, I grew up in a town built around a core with a grid layout and a bunch of outer suburbs filled with meandering streets, twisty turns and cul-de-sacs. I don't often get lost, but I sometimes experience strange illusions where I emerge from a street having travelled further than expected, or where I suddenly realise that I am facing 90 off where I thought I was. When I was young my friends and I used to walk home together and there was a street we nicknamed "the magic street" because it was like this - it was inside a grid layout but had a kink at 45 degrees about halfway along. It honestly felt like you suddenly teleported about 100 metres when you got to the end of it and found yourself a block further home than you "felt". It's hard to describe because having walked it hundreds of times we knew where we were.
My speculation is that my/our brains can switch between different navigation modes (regular grid layout versus arbitrary higgledy piggledy layouts) and there's a "trap" where the layout is almost-but-not-quite a grid where grid logic fails you. There was a neighbourhood where I lived in another city where two grids joined at an angle and there was mishaped pentagonal block that always used to give me weird vibes, like my brain was trying to force it into the grid pattern and it wouldn't go.
posted by L.P. Hatecraft at 9:25 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]
My speculation is that my/our brains can switch between different navigation modes (regular grid layout versus arbitrary higgledy piggledy layouts) and there's a "trap" where the layout is almost-but-not-quite a grid where grid logic fails you. There was a neighbourhood where I lived in another city where two grids joined at an angle and there was mishaped pentagonal block that always used to give me weird vibes, like my brain was trying to force it into the grid pattern and it wouldn't go.
posted by L.P. Hatecraft at 9:25 PM on April 14 [3 favorites]
He recommends that struggling navigators ask themselves which way is north 10 times a day,This is the thing though the article identifies that people from cities with complex/irregular layouts have different core assumptions to people from grid cities. I'm from Sydney, which is a directional shambles. Nobody here thinks about cardinal points, even when locations have the names (north shore, eastern suburbs). Where's Parramatta Road? Which side of the railway line are we on? Which way is the coast from here? What is the chain of chicken shops called? Those are the only things that matter.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 9:55 PM on April 14 [6 favorites]
I used to live in the same house as a woman who had no sense of direction and no memory of place. It was impossible to give her directions because she could not understand "go north, and then go west", and she could not understand "turn left at the post office, and then turn right at the church." She always asked for directions.
posted by Multicellular Exothermic at 3:37 AM on April 15
posted by Multicellular Exothermic at 3:37 AM on April 15
I grew up as a map reader. My family took long road trips to visit relatives in Florida every summer and I was always looking at the map because there wasn't much to see along the route back in the 70's (plus my folks never had to endure "are we there, yet"). I think that my way of navigating is by creating mental snapshots.
If I have time to look at a map and create a mental image then I can fairly easily find my way, and I also use this with finding my way in buildings (give me a moment to see a floorplan sketch and I'm set.) But the difficulty lies when I visit somewhere that I used to live decades ago and haven't been able to updare my mental map; I remain lost until I can replace my head map. I can only guess at how disorienting the head-flip must be.
posted by mightshould at 3:44 AM on April 15 [1 favorite]
If I have time to look at a map and create a mental image then I can fairly easily find my way, and I also use this with finding my way in buildings (give me a moment to see a floorplan sketch and I'm set.) But the difficulty lies when I visit somewhere that I used to live decades ago and haven't been able to updare my mental map; I remain lost until I can replace my head map. I can only guess at how disorienting the head-flip must be.
posted by mightshould at 3:44 AM on April 15 [1 favorite]
Out of cell range you can lose that context .
There are ways , as BungaDunga pointed out, cache the maps etc.
I'm not that familiar with it,
Yeah AllTrails lets you download them. That’s what I use, anyway.
posted by panama joe at 5:36 AM on April 15 [1 favorite]
There are ways , as BungaDunga pointed out, cache the maps etc.
I'm not that familiar with it,
Yeah AllTrails lets you download them. That’s what I use, anyway.
posted by panama joe at 5:36 AM on April 15 [1 favorite]
I've had a similar experience as brook horse, but only since moving just under a year ago. I wake up in the middle of the night and occasionally it happens - I have no idea where I am, so I try to sit up, but get up on the wrong side of the bed and bang my head. It's like playing a video game where the hallway or map hasn't loaded and you're in a dimensionless space.
Note that I have moved 15 times in my life and lived in two different countries and five different states over four decades and this is the only time it's ever happened.
Also face blind. I navigate through landmarks and adverts. I find large cities (grid or no grid) easier to navigate.
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 5:55 AM on April 15 [2 favorites]
Note that I have moved 15 times in my life and lived in two different countries and five different states over four decades and this is the only time it's ever happened.
Also face blind. I navigate through landmarks and adverts. I find large cities (grid or no grid) easier to navigate.
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 5:55 AM on April 15 [2 favorites]
I’ve been thinking about this a lot, and have realized that while travelling to other cities, I have always found subway-type systems (e.g. Paris Metro, New York Subway, London Underground) very easy to learn to navigate. Upon reflection, I *think* it’s because subway maps don’t look the same as a topographical map. They are very stylized and only feature straight and curving lines that represent the general direction you’re going and nothing else. You plan out your journey on the map by finding your destination and finding your starting point and moving along the lines and connectors until you get to where you need to go. All the (to me) confusing extras have been removed. You do not need to look around yourself and know which way is north, south, etc. to get yourself to your destination by following a subway map.
I have consistently been able to look at a map of any large urban subway/metro and correctly and easily figure out my journey without help from someone else—something that feels like a bit of a miracle for me, given my intense struggles with direction. I suppose the most challenging part is when I get out at a connecting station and have to get myself to the correct platform for the next leg, but there is generally good signage pointing the way. I’m good at following signs.
I *think* what I mean is, to use the terminology in the article, subway/metro maps are route-knowledge based, not survey-knowledge based. If subway maps looked like topographical maps, I’d be hooped.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 10:53 AM on April 15
I have consistently been able to look at a map of any large urban subway/metro and correctly and easily figure out my journey without help from someone else—something that feels like a bit of a miracle for me, given my intense struggles with direction. I suppose the most challenging part is when I get out at a connecting station and have to get myself to the correct platform for the next leg, but there is generally good signage pointing the way. I’m good at following signs.
I *think* what I mean is, to use the terminology in the article, subway/metro maps are route-knowledge based, not survey-knowledge based. If subway maps looked like topographical maps, I’d be hooped.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 10:53 AM on April 15
Subway maps are topological, showing only connectivity between lines and stations, and the order of stations along lines, while allowing arbitrary amounts of distortion in the actual positions of the lines and stations and distances between them.
posted by mubba at 12:10 PM on April 15 [2 favorites]
posted by mubba at 12:10 PM on April 15 [2 favorites]
And the one that's the model for all the other ones, London's Tube map of 1933, was designed by an electrical engineer, who was used to thinking of circuits which are also represented topologically.
posted by signal at 12:18 PM on April 15 [2 favorites]
posted by signal at 12:18 PM on April 15 [2 favorites]
Topological! Thank you, that was the word I was looking for but didn’t know. That’s so neat that the Tube map was designed by an electrical engineer based on representations of electrical circuits. We have a tea towel with the Paris Metro Map on it which I find very visually pleasing.
I referred to other maps as topographical (which is a type of map) but actually I meant what is apparently rather prosaically referred to as a “road and street map.”
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 12:51 PM on April 15
I referred to other maps as topographical (which is a type of map) but actually I meant what is apparently rather prosaically referred to as a “road and street map.”
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 12:51 PM on April 15
What is the chain of chicken shops called? Those are the only things that matter.
It'd be interesting to identify cities where you can deduce directions from local chains. I don't think in most of the US you can do so - there are vague lines based on chain restaurants, like for example the density of major chain restaurants falls as population density rises. But within metros? I don't think so...
There used to be jokes like 'gun store gun store pawn shop liquor store - that's a bad area', but the proliferation of small batch liquor stores and the explosion of gun stores make it not so true anymore.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:57 PM on April 15
It'd be interesting to identify cities where you can deduce directions from local chains. I don't think in most of the US you can do so - there are vague lines based on chain restaurants, like for example the density of major chain restaurants falls as population density rises. But within metros? I don't think so...
There used to be jokes like 'gun store gun store pawn shop liquor store - that's a bad area', but the proliferation of small batch liquor stores and the explosion of gun stores make it not so true anymore.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:57 PM on April 15
Topographic refers to representations of the 3d shape of an area, usually as curves through points with equal altitudes. I'd probably state the distinction you're making as geographic (represents distances, sizes, and directions) vs topological (represents connections).
posted by signal at 2:22 PM on April 15 [2 favorites]
posted by signal at 2:22 PM on April 15 [2 favorites]
> I mean a clear, lucid, I am looking at a location that I have never been in before. Then you start to see the details, the shape of the doorway, the familiar shadows, and you realize it’s supposed to be your bedroom, your hallway, your bathroom.
So what you're suggesting is there are people who this doesn't happen to. Huh. It doesn't happen to me often, and my bedroom is so dark that it isn't actually what I can see. But I wake up and have absolutely no idea where I am.
I have a lousy sense of direction but I think I'm actually helped by always having the GPS going when I drive. It helps me figure out a mental map. I'm a very visual person, and I feel like it's tapping in to that.
posted by The corpse in the library at 6:28 PM on April 16
So what you're suggesting is there are people who this doesn't happen to. Huh. It doesn't happen to me often, and my bedroom is so dark that it isn't actually what I can see. But I wake up and have absolutely no idea where I am.
I have a lousy sense of direction but I think I'm actually helped by always having the GPS going when I drive. It helps me figure out a mental map. I'm a very visual person, and I feel like it's tapping in to that.
posted by The corpse in the library at 6:28 PM on April 16
So what you're suggesting is there are people who this doesn't happen to. Huh.
Hi, can confirm that what waking up not immediately recognising where you are (assuming it is a familiar place and, and not somewhere you got put because you passed out our whatever) sounds both incredibly foreign and incredibly scary. Not something I have experienced, nor do I wish to.
posted by Dysk at 12:25 AM on April 17
Hi, can confirm that what waking up not immediately recognising where you are (assuming it is a familiar place and, and not somewhere you got put because you passed out our whatever) sounds both incredibly foreign and incredibly scary. Not something I have experienced, nor do I wish to.
posted by Dysk at 12:25 AM on April 17
Hi, can confirm that what waking up not immediately recognising where you are (assuming it is a familiar place and, and not somewhere you got put because you passed out our whatever) sounds both incredibly foreign and incredibly scary. Not something I have experienced, nor do I wish to.
I do this fairly often, both at home and when traveling. It's momentarily disorienting (especially when I wake up thinking I'm in place A and then realize I'm in place B) but not scary or anything like that. I've stubbed my toes a few times in hotel rooms when getting up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and thinking the bathroom is to my left when actually it's to the right, or vice versa. I've wondered if maybe it's because I've lived in so many different places, so I just don't have a "home place" hard wired?
posted by Dip Flash at 6:44 AM on April 17 [1 favorite]
I do this fairly often, both at home and when traveling. It's momentarily disorienting (especially when I wake up thinking I'm in place A and then realize I'm in place B) but not scary or anything like that. I've stubbed my toes a few times in hotel rooms when getting up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and thinking the bathroom is to my left when actually it's to the right, or vice versa. I've wondered if maybe it's because I've lived in so many different places, so I just don't have a "home place" hard wired?
posted by Dip Flash at 6:44 AM on April 17 [1 favorite]
Hmm, I also have moved more than average and also don’t find it particularly scary. Possibly!
posted by The corpse in the library at 10:21 AM on April 17
posted by The corpse in the library at 10:21 AM on April 17
I feel like I navigate best in cities/areas near the ocean. Like, if I can orient myself by going "the ocean is that way, so this other place I need to go is that way," then I'm much less likely to get lost. A big hill or mountain will also do in a pinch, and so will a river. Otherwise my sense of direction is middling at best. Like, if you give me directions using cardinal directions, that's next to useless to me. I'll figure it out, but in the moment, if someone tells me "go north on X street," I will have no idea what that means in relation to where I am now.
Also, I've gotten on the train going in the wrong direction multiple times, because north bound?? South bound?? East, west? I am underground! I can't see shit to tell me what direction that is! And the way a lot of lines will be named by the final point on the line when I might have no idea where that is because I'm just visiting this city is not helpful. That shit is hard for me to work out in a new city when I'm underground.
posted by yasaman at 12:31 PM on April 17
Also, I've gotten on the train going in the wrong direction multiple times, because north bound?? South bound?? East, west? I am underground! I can't see shit to tell me what direction that is! And the way a lot of lines will be named by the final point on the line when I might have no idea where that is because I'm just visiting this city is not helpful. That shit is hard for me to work out in a new city when I'm underground.
posted by yasaman at 12:31 PM on April 17
dg: When there's no phone signal, GPS will show you exactly where you are, but the phone can't download the information to show you the map
Which is why downloading the maps before you get there is so helpful. And the good navigation apps will let you do that.
posted by Too-Ticky at 1:52 AM on April 22 [1 favorite]
Which is why downloading the maps before you get there is so helpful. And the good navigation apps will let you do that.
posted by Too-Ticky at 1:52 AM on April 22 [1 favorite]
I feel like I navigate best in cities/areas near the ocean.
Living on the east coast of South Island (New Zealand) means there is an "ocean this way, mountains that way" aspect to navigation along almost the entire length of the island.
Hence California was especially confusing for me at times as it has the same "ocean this way, mountains that way" thing going on - but flipped east/west, and my north/south directional sense was messed up (until I got used to the northern hemisphere).
I was used to "mountains on my left, sun on my face" == facing North. In California of course "mountains on my left, sun on my face" == facing South.
posted by HiroProtagonist at 6:45 PM on April 23 [1 favorite]
Living on the east coast of South Island (New Zealand) means there is an "ocean this way, mountains that way" aspect to navigation along almost the entire length of the island.
Hence California was especially confusing for me at times as it has the same "ocean this way, mountains that way" thing going on - but flipped east/west, and my north/south directional sense was messed up (until I got used to the northern hemisphere).
I was used to "mountains on my left, sun on my face" == facing North. In California of course "mountains on my left, sun on my face" == facing South.
posted by HiroProtagonist at 6:45 PM on April 23 [1 favorite]
That concept shows up in traditional Hawaiian directions, where mauka means toward the mountain and makai means towards the ocean.
posted by The corpse in the library at 8:41 PM on April 23 [2 favorites]
posted by The corpse in the library at 8:41 PM on April 23 [2 favorites]
As a Chilean, I don't get lost when I'm someplace without a large mountain range in view as much as feel uncomfortable and bad for the people who have to live in flatland.
posted by signal at 7:38 AM on April 24 [1 favorite]
posted by signal at 7:38 AM on April 24 [1 favorite]
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And meanwhile, I still regularly take wrong turns on bike rides I've done a hundred times. Something something land of contrasts.
posted by kaibutsu at 9:35 AM on April 14 [3 favorites]