Study explores remarkable ways traditional cultures use their environments to navigate

A study has shed new light on the remarkable feats of navigation in cultures around the world: from sailors in the Marshall Islands using wave patterns to navigate the vast Pacific Ocean to Native communities in Alaska using the stars to navigate. making a path through the Yukon.

The study, carried out by researchers from the University of York and University College London, aims to show what Western science can learn from exceptional navigators using traditional techniques, some of which have been used for thousands of years .

It highlights the neglected role of culture and its close connection with the environment in the art and science of wayfinding in complex landscapes, where there are often no paths or landmarks, and where mistakes can be fatal.

The study authors say these idiosyncratic methods for solving navigation problems offer important new insights into how navigation is understood in cognitive science research.

Co-lead author of the study, Dr Pablo Fernandez Velasco, a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Philosophy at the University of York, said: “The navigational feats described in our paper describe some methods of orientation so skillful that it seems implausible to many of us who rely on GPS to find our way almost everywhere. »

“The incredible techniques we explored are at risk of being lost in a world that relies heavily on technology and faces rapid changes to the natural environment due to climate change. Many of the crops highlighted in our study are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of rising water levels and changing landscapes and weather conditions.

“Our study changes the way we think about how the brain remembers the location of things. Instead of focusing solely on how our minds store these memories, Western science should start viewing navigation as a dynamic, action-oriented skill that involves a blend of different senses, ways of thinking, and problem-solving strategies.

The journal presents navigation techniques that engage a range of skills and senses from 49 populations in 30 countries around the world.

Professor Hugo Spiers, co-lead author from University College London, said: “It was a joy to create the first map of the world revealing where these different traditional communities were and the diversity of environments reported. We hope this will help future researchers explore this topic. “

The techniques described in the study include:

• Marshall Islands sailors use wave steering to navigate the open seas in the Pacific. Navigators decide on an initial course based on their knowledge of the configuration of the islands, then use changes in the rhythmic movement of the canoe to feel the transformation of the wave configuration.
• The Gwich’in indigenous community of northern Alaska uses the stars to find their way across the vast plains of the Yukon. The unusual strategy involves looking at the night sky and projecting different stars onto the attributes of the mythical fox-like creature, Yahdii. The stars form Yahdii’s tail, leg, or snout, and each guides the traveler to different regions of the plains.
• For the Batek people of Malaysia, auditory cues such as birdsong help them know where they are in the rainforest. This is an important skill, as the rainforest is visually impenetrable after a few meters.

The study also examines the techniques of experts who follow local navigation traditions within Western culture and in urban environments, such as London’s licensed taxi drivers. Without GPS, these taxi drivers must be able to plan the shortest route between two locations in a city of nearly 26,000 streets.

To do this, they combine two types of visualization techniques: they imagine the map of London from a bird’s eye view, drawing sub-objectives along it, and they use their in situ experience to simulate views of the route on the street.

Dr Fernandez Velasco added: “From the labyrinthine streets of London to the southeast coast of Greenland, we found consistent evidence of how the diversity of landscapes in which humans live is reflected in the diversity of seafaring cultures . cognitive sciences do not reflect this diversity.

“Future research can not only help us understand human behavior more deeply, but it can also help us understand, preserve, revive and adapt incredibly rich browsing cultures that play an important role in connecting people to their local environment.”

The research is published in the journal Trends in cognitive science.