Individuals differ in preferences to use route versus survey strategies or distal versus proximal cues for navigation. The current study aimed to examine the effects of environmental structure experience in environment representations. Two groups of participants from Salt Lake City (Utah, USA) and Padua (Veneto, Italy) completed a series of navigation tasks in familiar and novel virtual environments as well as navigation strategy questionnaires. The results showed that Padua participants – compared to Utah participants - had more accurate survey knowledge of locations in their city and country, were more accurate at using proximal cues to remember target locations, and were more likely to use navigation strategies that involved shortcuts. Utah participants did not use distal cues more accurately or use more survey-based strategies despite their higher reported sense of direction and cardinal knowledge compared to Padua participants. Overall the results support that environmental demands shape environment strategies and performance.

个体在使用路线与调查策略或远端与近端提示进行导航时的偏好有所不同。当前的研究旨在检验环境结构经验对环境表征的影响。盐湖城（美国犹他州）和帕多瓦（意大利威尼托）的两组参与者在熟悉和新颖的虚拟环境中完成了一系列导航任务，并完成了导航策略问卷。结果表明，与犹他州的参与者相比，帕多瓦的参与者对他们所在的城市和国家/地区的位置具有更准确的调查知识，在使用近端提示记忆目标位置时更准确，并且更有可能使用涉及捷径的导航策略。犹他州参与者与帕多瓦参与者相比，虽然报告的方向感和基本知识更高，但并未更准确地使用远端线索或使用更多基于调查的策略。总体而言，结果支持环境需求影响着环境战略和绩效。