Abstract: Previous studies have showed that young children's reorientation behaviors are mainly guided by the geometric information of the environment.Children often reorient themselves according to the shape of the testing room and not in accord with the room's non-geometric properties such as landmarks.Although some landmarks were used in some tasks,it is only the direct connection between landmark and target objects.The purpose of the present study is to further examine the role of landmark in children's reorientation.In Experiment 1,a rectangular testing room (1.9×1.2×1.2 m) and four color landmarks (0.56×0.22 m) were used.All the walls of the rectangular room were made of wood and were pasted in white cloth.Two land marks were painted in red and the other two were painted in yellow.All the materials were placed in a circle place,in which the other clues such as light and sound were controlled effectively.In Experiment 2,the rectangular tes ting room was moved out.In Experiment 3 the rectangular testing room was moved in,but the color of all four land marks were identical.3-4 year-olds were firstly allowed to explore the environment.Then they watched the experimenter to hide an object such as an orange behind one of the landmark.Following one of the two experimental manipulations,the participants were required to retrieve the object.On oriented search trials,the participants retrieved the object after turning 360 degree in place for four times with their eyes open.This served as a control condition that probed whether the participants remembered where the experimenter had hidden the object.On disoriented search trials,the participants retrieved the object after turning four to six times in place with their eyes closed,a condition that has been found to induce a state of disorientation in children of this age.Results in Experiment 1indicated that children went frequently and reliably to the correct corner,where is geo metrical and color appropriate.This suggests that children can integrate the geometrical and landmark information in reorientation.When the geometrical clue was limited by moving out the rectangular testing room in Experiment 2,children could still use the landmarks to reorient themselves,and showed a higher accuracy of searching in the correct corner.The results of the Experiment 3 indicated that children searched geometrically appropriate locations more often than geometrically inappropriate locations,but did not search proximate locations more often than distant locations.The present study provides converging evidence suggesting that children did not rely solely on the geometric information.In fact,they can integrate the geometric information with the landmark clues in their reorientation behaviors.Especially,they can use only the landmark in reorientation.

Key words: Children, spatial representation, reorientation, landmark, integrate