But the map *does *correspond to the outside world! The world doesn’t rotate when you turn.
Interesting, my wife and I are a microcosm of that study. My wife likes the map to match her view of the road, so that when the little blue arrow is turning left on the map, she knows that she is supposed to turn left. She visualizes the area about 100 feet around her car, with her car being the center of the universe. I, on the other hand, after decades of learning to navigate using paper maps, like to use the GPS display like I use a paper map. What I visualize is the entire environment and imagine myself as I move through it, more Copernican-style. I have no trouble when I’m driving south and it shows an arrow going down and to the right, and I know that means I will turn left. When I drive my wife’s car, the map rotates every time I make a turn and it gives me vertigo.
Now, to address the OP, to avoid making this a total hijack, stereotypes do not evolve in a vacuum but I am not a social scientist or psychologist and I cannot explain how they come about. But they are usually perpetuated by confirmation bias. If you get 100 Australians in your classes and one of them goes out to party, you’re going to say, “See! The Australians are the most likely to party!” Your observations are 100% subjective and unless you have objective data to back them up you don’t have any basis to reach any of those conclusions. Did you keep notes on the national origin and behavior of every person in your courses?
Something I had to get used to in Indiana, and it took me forever, is that people in Indiana can always tell you where North is, and they give directions that way. This is how you get directions in Indiana:
“Go a half-mile north, turn west, and go another mile, and you’re there.” And this would be for something in a town. If you ask for landmarks, they’ll still tell you “There’s a McDonald’s on the west side of the street about before the last stop sign.”
In New York, if you ask where something is, they give you cross streets, and if you don’t know where those streets are, they tell you to walk in blocks, and to turn left or right, and what landmarks you will pass.
To be fair, places like Indiana were often laid out on a true north-south-east-west grid. So using those orientations would work successfully. Whereas New York, not so much. You go with what you got.
The other day, my neighbor claimed to have an IQ of 160. I generally like the guy. I have drinks and cigars with him sometimes. Let’s say I’m a little skeptical that he’s in the top, what?, 0.03% of the population.
I don’t fly, but I prefer north up orientation on my GPS driving, and I know several others who do, too. I am not Indian. With track up orientation, I have a much more difficult time understanding where I am, which direction I’m going, and where two points are relative to each other. With north up orientation, I always know which direction I’m going in and can visualize on a map where I am.
I live in an area with a heavy population of Asians. The vast majority of the Asians are driving just like anyone else but if you do come across a slow, overly polite, overly cautious driver chances are he or she will be Asian.
I think a lot of folks tend to revel in the stereotypes of their people, thus perpetuating them. This includes stereotypes that outsiders might see as negative, such as being cheap (they are thrifty!). Obviously, not all of any given group.
New Englanders really do rarely talk to strangers. But not because they’re impolite - not talking to strangers without a fairly good reason to bother them is considered being polite here.
Yeah, when I was growing up in Indianapolis, I thought I had an excellent sense of direction. NOPE! It’s just that Indy’s built on a grid. Now in Hampton Roads, I have no idea where the hell anything is.
Stereotype I’ve found to be true: Korean shopkeepers are cold, taciturn, brusque and surly to the point of rudeness.
UNTIL you’ve been coming to their store for many years. Then, long after you’ve gotten used to them being unsmiling, icy automatons, they’ll surprise you by relaxing and turning into cut-ups. They’re hilarious once they let their guard down. But they may take a decade to let their guard down.
There is a large population of upper-middle-class Koreans in the city where I work, a fact that has no proven connection to the uncannily high frequency with which I find myself stuck behind a Lexus doing 10 miles under the speed limit.
If I didn’t know better, I would assume you have a handle-bar moustache, wear a fedora and a vest over tee-shirts with ironic slogans and ride a single-speed bike all around Portland.
