Curiosity shapes spatial exploration and cognitive map formation in humans.

ABSTRACT: Cognitive maps are thought to arise, at least in part, from our intrinsic curiosity to explore unknown places. However, it remains untested how curiosity shapes aspects of spatial exploration in humans. Combining a virtual reality task with indices of exploration complexity, we found that pre-exploration curiosity states predicted how much individuals spatially explored environments, whereas markers of visual exploration determined post-exploration feelings of interest. Moreover, individual differences in curiosity traits, particularly Stress Tolerance, modulated the relationship between curiosity and spatial exploration, suggesting the capacity to cope with uncertainty enhances the curiosity-exploration link. Furthermore, both curiosity and spatial exploration predicted how precisely part

SUBMITTER: Cen D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11685098 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature