3% of people are affected by Topographical Developmental Disorientation

Imagine for a while being unable to locate yourself in the area where you live… It would be terrible, wouldn't it? It turns out that the lives of many patients are like this because they experience some kind of psychological disability.

In that case, a new study published in PLOS One reports that approximately 3% of people are affected by Topographical Developmental Disorientation (TDD). Check out the full article and learn more about the disorder in which the person loses sense of location.

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What is topographic disorientation?

DTD refers to a lack of guidance from childhood. This is despite the absence of any apparent brain damage, neurological disturbance, or generalized cognitive deficits. As such, individuals affected by this condition are unable to create a mental representation of their surroundings and use that as a guide. Because of this, people who have DTD often get lost in familiar surroundings like their home or neighborhood. That is, we are not talking about healthy individuals, who just have little sense of direction.

For decades, topographical disorientation has been researched using case studies of patients who lost their ability to find their way in large-scale locomotor environments.

Study carried out with 1698 individuals

The researchers say the study posted on PLOS One was carried out with the aim of estimating the prevalence of DTD in a sample of Italian adults. In this analysis, the intent was to define treatment guidelines and a shared national research strategy.

The research volunteers were part of groups from Italian regions between the years 2016 and 2019. In total, there were 1,698 individuals (635 men) without neurological disorders, aged between 18 and 35 years and with an average schooling of 14.8 years. They took anamnesis, indicating many aspects of her life, as well as medical problems in her past. In addition, measures of familiarity and spatial cognition style (right-to-left confusion and sense of direction) were also taken.

Study results

Participants would be categorized as having DTD if they showed two deviations from the mean for “sense of direction”. In the results, only a percentage of approximately 3% of the participants met the criteria for having DTD.

Gender was more predisposed to the sense of direction criterion than education per se. Women reported having problems with their sense of direction and using landmark-based navigation strategies. And although men typically have better navigation skills, they are at a higher risk of having DTD.