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Using a Mobile Robot to Test a Theory of Cognitive Mapping

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Robotics and Cognitive Approaches to Spatial Mapping

Part of the book series: Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics ((STAR,volume 38))

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Abstract

This paper describes using a mobile robot, equipped with some sonar sensors and an odometer, to test navigation through the use of a cognitive map. The robot explores an office environment, computes a cognitive map, which is a network of ASRs [36, 35], and attempts to find its way home. Ten trials were conducted and the robot found its way home each time. From four random positions in two trials, the robot estimated the home position relative to its current position reasonably accurately. Our robot does not solve the simultaneous localization and mapping problem and the map computed is fuzzy and inaccurate with much of the details missing. In each homeward journey, it computes a new cognitive map of the same part of the environment, as seen from the perspective of the homeward journey. We show how the robot uses distance information from both maps to find its way home.

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Authors
  1. Wai K. Yeap
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  2. Chee K. Wong
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  3. Jochen Schmidt
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Margaret E. Jefferies Wai-Kiang Yeap

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© 2007 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Yeap, W.K., Wong, C.K., Schmidt, J. (2007). Using a Mobile Robot to Test a Theory of Cognitive Mapping. In: Jefferies, M.E., Yeap, WK. (eds) Robotics and Cognitive Approaches to Spatial Mapping. Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics, vol 38. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-75388-9_17

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-75388-9_17

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-75386-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-75388-9

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