Peer-reviewed article

Inside, on, and beyond the body: development and organization of interoceptive, bodily, and navigational representations in children and young adults.

Daniela Malangone, Erica Dolce, Piergiovanna Menniti, Alessandra Caruso, Silvia Canino et al. · 9 Aug 2026

Abstract

Although recent theoretical accounts suggest potential links among interoceptive processing, functional body representations, and navigation, these domains have rarely been examined together across development, and little is known about how their organization may differ between childhood and adulthood. The present study investigated age-related differences in these three domains and their organization by comparing school-aged children and young adults. In a cross-sectional study, 138 school-aged children (7-8 and 9-10 years) and 96 young adults (18-35 years) completed six tasks assessing interoceptive accuracy, configurational and action-oriented body representations, and landmark, route, and survey knowledge of a virtual environment. Regarding cardiac interoceptive accuracy, mixed-design analyses did not provide evidence of age-related differences. In contrast, functional body representations showed possible distinct developmental trajectories: configurational body representation may reach an adult-like level by the age of 9-10 years, whereas action-oriented body representation may continue to develop beyond this stage. Concerning navigational space development, landmark and route knowledge were comparable across age groups, whereas young adults were more accurate than both child groups in survey knowledge. In addition, exploratory factor analyses suggested that the organization and coupling of these domains may vary across age groups. Overall, the findings suggest possible differences in the developmental trajectories of interoceptive, bodily, and navigational representations and provide preliminary evidence for age-related variation in their organization.