Using Landmarks without Remembering Them: Attribute Amnesia in Landmark-Guided Navigation

Everyday navigation requires people to use landmark information online while forming longer-term spatial representations. The present study asked whether attribute amnesia (AA) – a failure to report recently attended, task-relevant features – also occurs during landmark-guided navigation, and how it affects spatial memory. In two experiments (N = 80), participants navigated virtual mazes by following colored arrows at intersections, either on a desktop display (Experiment 1) or in immersive VR (Experiment 2). In an Identity-Test group, surprise identity probes asked for the color of the landmark at critical intersections; a Navigation-Only group performed the same navigation without probes. Across both display formats, navigation accuracy was perfect, yet identity reports on the first surprise trial were at chance and recovered only once testing was anticipated, demonstrating robust AA in a continuous, ecologically embedded navigation task. A second maze without identity tests assessed whether landmark identity was incorporated into longer-term spatial representations via color recall and route reconstruction. Landmark colors were remembered poorly overall, indicating that behaviorally critical identity information was largely excluded from durable spatial representations. Probing landmark identity impaired the consolidation of a complete route scaffold on the desktop but not in VR, where route memory remained intact. These findings show that AA generalizes to navigation and that embodied cues in immersive VR can buffer its costs for route knowledge.