I've kept bees for years and read quite a bit about experiments with them, especially with regards to how they communicate, but have never heard this. Where did you read about this? I have serious doubts this is true. Last summer I had the need to move a hive. I observed the bees leave the hive and fly southwest down the driveway. I moved the hive 10 feet forward and rotated it 90°. When leaving the hive flew the same path both before and after I moved and rotated the hive but they took one or two extra orientation circles before heading southwest for some time after I moved the hive. Incidentally one can buy a rotating Api-Anivet chamber for their hive to eliminate Varroa mites and I've never heard of them disturbing a bees ability to communicate. The way one finds a hive in the wild is to capture a bee and hold it in a container where it cannot see daylight and then rotate the container several times. The bee will then fly in a spiral pattern upward to orient itself and fly straight back to the hive. Do this several times in succession with different bees and you will eventually find the hive. Bees see sunlight through a polarized filter and orient everything to a combination of the sun, magnetic north, and landmarks. Rotating the hive will not change the position of the sun relative to the hive nor will it change magnetic north. None of this means I believe bees do much in the way of cognition by the way.
John Thornton