Path Integration

A cognitive navigation process in which a person tracks their position relative to a starting point by continuously monitoring their movements — including direction changes, distance traveled, and turns taken. People who are blind rely heavily on path integration when navigating unfamiliar environments, mentally computing their location from remembered movement sequences. This process is cognitively demanding and error-prone, particularly over long distances or complex routes, which is why assistive indoor navigation systems aim to reduce this burden by providing real-time position updates.