Little is known about the precise nature of the processing, storage, and recall strategies functional in spatial recall. High school and college samples completed tasks in field-dependence-independence, figural creativity, and verbal abilities. Spatial recall ability was assessed through a map reconstruction task in which subjects were required to accurately reproduce the spatial location of features they recalled from a learned map stimulus. Results showed that field-dependence-independence and figural creativity were significant determinants of spatial recall for both samples. Verbal ability was a significant factor only for the less verbal, more heterogeneous high school sample. The data support a model of cognitive processing in which effective recall of spatial attributes is dictated by subjects' abilities to treat spatial arrays as part-whole relations: Individual entities must be considered as separable from the whole map context. The results are discussed in conjunction with accepted theories of human memory and spatial cognition. (Author)