This study investigates whether spatial navigation based on allocentric
reference frames, which are by definition independent of the observer's
body, can be understood within an action-oriented approach. Three
experiments tested the knowledge of the absolute orientation of houses
and streets towards the north, the relative orientation of two houses
and two streets, respectively, and the location of houses towards each
other in a pointing task. The main results showed that under time
pressure, people were more accurate on the relative orientation task for
houses but they were more accurate on the absolute orientation task for
streets. Performance in the pointing task was best. This demonstrates
that information in all-centric reference frames is coded in an action
oriented way.