Mental walking through a complex maze influences lateralized ultradian rhythms

Subjects of two experimental groups, 10 males and 10 females in each group, explored artificial environments represented by compact city mazes. The ma zes, a simple and a complex one, were generated by means of a computer prog ram. After turning the program on, a scene with houses, streets, and alleys appeared on a TV screen. The subjects sat in front of the screen and manoe uvered through the simple or the complex maze with the help of a hand-opera ted device. Correspondingly the street scenes changed in such a way that th e subject had the illusion oi a normal pace. Each subject explored one maze for eight hours. Every 15 min, an experimenter interrupted the subject's w alk and measured tactile discrimination in either hand: Ultradian periodic variations in the tactile error rate of the right and left hands with perio ds of 2 or 3 hours are found. They are considered manifestations of endogen ous rhythms operating separately in the left and right cerebral hemispheres . As demonstrated in a previous paper, lateralized ultradian rhythms in tac tile discrimination are different for males and females when tested under q uiet laboratory conditions. The present paper shows that the rhythms are sp ecifically influenced in both sexes by the spatial complexity of an artific ial environment (maze). These findings are discussed from an evolutionary p oint of view.