Accumulating evidence suggests that distinct aspects of successful navigation—path integration, spatial-knowledge acquisition, and navigation strategies—change with advanced age. Yet few studies have established whether navigation deficits emerge early in the aging process (prior to age 65) or whether early age-related deficits vary by sex. Here, we probed healthy young adults (ages 18–28) and midlife adults (ages 43–61) on three essential aspects of navigation. We found, first, that path-integration ability shows negligible effects of sex or age. Second, robust sex differences in spatial-knowledge acquisition are observed not only in young adulthood but also, although with diminished effect, at midlife. Third, by midlife, men and women show decreased ability to acquire spatial knowledge and increased reliance on taking habitual paths. Together, our findings indicate that age-related changes in navigation ability and strategy are evident as early as midlife and that path-integration ability is spared, to some extent, in the transition from youth to middle age.

越来越多的证据表明，成功导航的不同方面——路径整合、空间知识获取和导航策略——会随着年龄的增长而变化。然而，很少有研究确定导航缺陷是否出现在衰老过程的早期（65 岁之前），或者早期与年龄相关的缺陷是否因性别而异。在这里，我们在导航的三个基本方面探讨了健康的年轻人（18-28 岁）和中年成年人（43-61 岁）。首先，我们发现路径整合能力对性别或年龄的影响可以忽略不计。其次，不仅在青年时期，而且在中年时也观察到空间知识获取方面的强烈性别差异，尽管效果减弱。第三，到中年，男性和女性获得空间知识的能力下降，并且越来越依赖于习惯性路径。一起，