What working memory subcomponents are needed in the acquisition of survey knowledge? Evidence from direction estimation and shortcut tasks

•We examined the involvement of verbal and spatial working memory in survey knowledge.•During navigation in a building was performed either a verbal or a spatial concurrent task.•Spatial secondary task interfered with encoding survey knowledge.

This study investigated whether and to what extent verbal and spatial working memory (WM) are implicated in the acquisition of survey knowledge through navigation in a real environment. We adopted a dual-task paradigm, asking participants to learn the layout of two floors of an unfamiliar building by navigation, and to perform either a verbal or a spatial concurrent task. Ninety undergraduates were assigned to one of three groups according to concurrent task condition: articulatory suppression, spatial tapping, or control (no concurrent task). Acquisition of a survey representation was tested by asking participants to perform direction estimations and shortcut tasks. The results showed that the spatial secondary task interfered most strongly with encoding survey knowledge.