Orientation in space through vision while walking involves a special part of the brain. This has been reported by the American National Eye Institute.
Daniel Dilks, one of the study’s authors, believes that two regions of the brain are involved in peripheral orientation: the occipital lobe and the retrosplenial complex. The retrosplenial complex works like a map, and you can navigate to a currently unseen destination – from a cave to a river, from a house to a shop, etc. – Required to achieve. The occipital lobe is used to avoid hitting objects and to be able to bypass walls and obstacles. However, there was a weakness in this theory: it was believed that in children under 8 years the occipital lobe was not involved in navigation, and yet children did not bump into objects. In this regard, the scientist recognized that the occipital lobe can appear early, but matures later.
To clarify this issue, Dilks and colleagues shot a series of first-person videos. All filmed in one place, only the method of movement has changed: walking, crawling and flying (which is not available to one person). When watching such videos, the brain often begins to act as if there were real events in front of it, so scientists were able to study the brain’s response to various methods of movement using functional magnetic resonance imaging. The study included 15 adult volunteers.
It turned out that the occipital lobe of the brain was activated when the participants watched walking videos. But when they watched other videos – “creep” or “fly” – the occipital lobe did not act. In contrast, the activation of the retrosplenial complex in all videos suggests that the occipital lobe is specific to walking, unlike other modes of visual navigation. In addition, crawling activated a number of other areas of the brain. From this, the authors conclude that other parts besides the occipital lobe and retrosplenial complex may be involved in navigation at an early age.
This research will help children understand how the brain develops as they grow and how children learn to interact with their environment.
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