Psychology Commons^™

Understanding The Home Spatial Environment, Nelcida L. Garcia

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Spatial thinking encompasses several related skills including understanding size, shape, translation and rotation of objects, and distance between objects. Individual differences in spatial thinking are important predictors of children’s math and science achievement, as well as later entry into Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines. This dissertation proposes Relational Developmental Systems Theory as a lens to study spatial development. Informed by Relational Developmental Systems Theory, two empirical studies examined whether mothers’ characteristics affected their parenting practices, and in turn, their children’s spatial abilities (i.e., mental rotation, spatial scaling). First, in a sample of 165 mother-child dyads, mothers’ spatial ability …

Where To Draw The Line: Evaluating Visuospatial And Attentional Processing In Individuals With Autism Spectrum Disorders, Alisha Steigerwald

University Honors Theses

Objective: We investigated visuospatial processing in individuals with autism using bisection and quadrisection tasks to evaluate the presence of a possible downward vertical spatial bias that could provide insights into the preference for attending to the mouth in ASD populations.

Methods: Twenty participants with ASD and 20 age, IQ, and sex-matched control participants were recruited (ages 6-23). Participants were asked to bisect, quadrisect from the top, and quadrisect from the bottom vertical lines placed in their left, center, and right visual spaces. Distance from the true midpoint and quadripoint were calculated and compared between the two groups.

Results: No significant …

The Relationship Between Creative Hobbies And Visual Spatial Ability, Victoria Alexander

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Recent developments in educational practices have identified the teaching of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) areas as important, but this emphasis on STEM fields has sacrificed educational focus on the Arts (Cohen, 2016). This is a significant loss, not only in terms of the loss of humanities education in itself, but through the potential loss of foundational skills through practice in artistic areas. The current paper explores this idea by investigating the correlational relationship between visual spatial abilities and participation in a variety of creative activities. Spatial ability is known to be a cognitive skill that underlies success in …

An Investigation Of The Role Of Spatial Ability In Representing And Solving Word Problems Among Engineering Students, Gavin Duffy, Sheryl A. Sorby, Brian Bowe

Articles

Background

Spatial ability is significantly related to performance in engineering education. Problem solving, an activity that is highly relevant to engineering education, has been linked to spatial ability.

Purpose/Hypothesis

To what extent is spatial ability related to problem solving among engineering students and how do approaches to problem representation and solution vary with spatial ability level?

Design/Method

Three instruments – a spatial ability test, word math problems and accompanying core math competency questions – were administered to two samples of first year engineering students in two different countries. Data were analyzed at the test level to evaluate the relationship of …

Role Of Spatial Ability In Musical Instrument Choice: Implications For Music Education, Tevis L. Tucker

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The intent of this thesis is to explore the relationship between spatial ability and the wide range of musical instruments musicians play. Existing literature has established a link between musicianship and improved spatial ability, but researchers have yet to look at how the spatial makeup of different musical instruments may, in turn, reveal unique levels of spatial proficiency from one instrumentalist to the next. This study was formatted as an online survey that included a music experience scale, a demographics scale, and two measures of spatial ability: the Card Rotations Test (CRT) and the Paper Folding Test (PFT). Participants who …

The Validity Of Inferring Real-World Cognitive Mapping Ability Based On Performance In A Virtual Environment, Chantelle M. Cocquyt

Brescia Psychology Undergraduate Honours Theses

This study investigated whether virtual environments (VE) have ecological validity in studies of cognitive mapping ability. Forty female undergraduate students completed the spatial orientation test (SOT) and other tasks that assessed their cognitive of real-world locations they visit often and a VE, through direction estimation and map accuracy tasks. Participants had lower error scores on real-world direction estimation than VE direction estimation, suggesting that the accuracy of their cognitive maps was associated with familiarity and exposure to an environment. Real-world direction estimation, VE direction estimation, and VE map building were all correlated with the SOT, suggesting a shared reliance on …

Dynamics Of Collaborative Navigation And Applying Data Driven Methods To Improve Pedestrian Navigation Instructions At Decision Points For People Of Varying Spatial Aptitudes, Gengen He

Doctoral Dissertations

Cognitive Geography seeks to understand individual decision-making variations based on fundamental cognitive differences between people of varying spatial aptitudes. Understanding fundamental behavioral discrepancies among individuals is an important step to improve navigation algorithms and the overall travel experience. Contemporary navigation aids, although helpful in providing turn-by-turn directions, lack important capabilities to distinguish decision points for their features and importance. Existing systems lack the ability to generate landmark or decision point based instructions using real-time or crowd sourced data. Systems cannot customize personalized instructions for individuals based on inherent spatial ability, travel history, or situations.

This dissertation presents a novel experimental …

Mental Rotation With Martial Arts Expertise, Michael E. Torres

HIM 1990-2015

This research aims to investigate whether expertise, specifically martial arts expertise, is transferrable across domains, which would indicate spatial skills in one task can also apply to a seemingly unrelated one. In this study, reaction time during a mental rotation task was compared between experts and novices. Participants were shown two images and had to decide if the images were the same or mirror reflections. The images were comprised of Shepard-Metzler blocks, people in martial arts poses, and people in neutral poses. The results suggest expertise is not transferable across domains. While experts outperformed novices with some of the martial …

Detecting Threats From Constituent Parts: A Fuzzy Signal Detection Theory Analysis Of Individual Differences, Ida Van De Car

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Signal detection theory (SDT) provides a theoretical framework for describing performance on decision making tasks, and fuzzy signal detection theory (FSDT) extends this description to include tasks in which there are levels of uncertainty regarding the categorization of stimulus events. Specifically, FSDT can be used to quantify the degree to which an event is 'signal-like', i.e., the degree to which a stimulus event can be characterized by both signal and non-signal properties. For instance, an improvised explosive device (IED) poses little threat when missing key elements of its assembly (a stimulus of low, but not zero, signal strength) whereas the …

Tailoring Instruction To The Individual: Investigating The Utility Of Trainee Aptitudes For Use In Adaptive Training, Carla Landsberg

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Computer-based training has become more prolific as the military and private business enterprises search for more efficient ways to deliver training. However, some methods of computer-based training are not more effective than traditional classroom methods. One technique that may be able to approximate the most effective form of training, one-on-one tutoring, is Adaptive Training (AT). AT techniques use instruction that is tailored to the learner in some way, and can adjust different training parameters such as difficulty, feedback, pace, and delivery mode. There are many ways to adapt training to the learner, and in this study I explored adapting the …

Letter Reversal Assessments: A Systematic Review Of Measurement Properties, Administration Guidelines And Reversal Content And Richmond Reversal Rating: Construct Validity In Relation To Visual-Spatial Abilities, Lucinda Venter

Theses : Honours

Background: With several assessments available that purport to measure the letter reversal rates of young school-aged children, the question was raised how reliable and comparable these assessments are and to what extent each assessment addresses the concept of letter reversals? A systematic review of these assessments was performed to evaluate the measurement properties and administration guidelines, and to compare the reversal content of these assessments.

Method: Relevant assessments and studies were identified through literature searches. For each of the assessments the measurement properties, quality of the studies that report the measurement properties, and administration guidelines were evaluated, and the content …

The Role Of Learning Modality Upon Long-Term Spatial Memory, Dale A. Hirsch

ETD Archive

Spatial cognition often requires the contemplation of multiple discrete layouts. Determining the relative direction of objects between distinct layouts comes with a cost to accuracy when compared to determining the relative direction among objects from within the same layout. The decrease in accuracy that results from comparing discrete layouts is called integration cost (Yamamoto & Shelton, 2008). Yamamoto (2007) found that the cost of integration between two layouts learned through the same modality is equivalent to the cost of integrating between two layouts learned through different modalities (i.e., vision and proprioception). Yamamoto's findings suggest that modulating the learning modalities of …

Visuo-Spatial Abilities In Remote Perception: A Meta-Analysis Of Empirical Work, Thomas Fincannon

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Meta-analysis was used to investigate the relationship between visuo-spatial ability and performance in remote environments. In order to be included, each study needed to examine the relationship between the use of an ego-centric perspective and various dimensions of performance (i.e., identification, localization, navigation, and mission completion time). The moderator analysis investigated relationships involving: (a) visuo-spatial construct with an emphasis on Carroll’s (1993) visualization (VZ) factor; (b) performance outcome (i.e., identification, localization, navigation, and mission completion time); (c) autonomy to support mission performance; (d) task type (i.e., navigation vs. reconnaissance); and (e) experimental testbed (i.e., physical vs. virtual environments). The process …

The Effects Of Diagrams And Relational Complexity On User Performance In Conditional Probability Problems In A Non-Learning Context, Vincent J. Kellen

College of Computing and Digital Media Dissertations

Many disciplines in everyday life depend on improved performance in conditional probability problems. Most adults struggle with conditional probability problems and several prior studies have shown participant accuracy is less than 50%. This study examined user performance when aided with computer-generated Venn and Euler type diagrams in a non-learning context. Despite the prevalence of research into diagrams and extensive research into conditional probability problem solving, this study is one of the only studies to apply theories of working memory to predict user performance in conditional probability problems with diagrams. Following relational complexity theory, this study manipulated problem complexity in computer …

The Poreh Nonverbal Memory Test, Chelsea Kalynn Kociuba

ETD Archive

Nonverbal memory focuses on the remembrance of information that cannot be described or put into a verbal component, such as remembering a person's face, identifying abstract stimuli, or remembering objects. Because nonverbal memory focuses on the remembrance of things that cannot be put into words it is a difficult construct to measure accurately. One area that is of great importance in the assessment of nonverbal abilities is spatial memory (Reynolds & Coress, 2007, Foster, Drago, & Harrison, 2009). Most of the tasks that have been developed to assess this construct employ verbally mediated clues allowing the examinee to compensate for …

Sex Differences In Visual-Spatial Ability: Components Of Cognitive Processing, Susan Loring-Meier

Theses Digitization Project

No abstract provided.

Factor Analytic Study Of Spatial Abilities In Second-Grade, English-Speaking Navajo And Non-Navajo Children, Laurie Sullivan-Sakaeda

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study was conducted to continue the investigation of apparent differences in cognitive abilities between Navajo Indian children and non-Navajo children. Subjects were 248 second-grade students, ranging from 7 to 9 years old. The Navajo sample lived in the Shiprock, New Mexico, area of the Navajo Indian Reservation, and the non-Navajo sample lived on the east side of Salt Lake City, Utah. Data were collected using six tests designed to measure spatial abilities in primary grade children. Results indicated that the non-Navajo children scored significantly higher on two individual tests and on the total test score under timed conditions, with …

Memory And Age Differences In Spatial Manipulation Ability, Timothy A. Salthouse, Deborah Mitchell, Roni Reiter-Palmon

Psychology Faculty Publications

Young and old adults were asked, in 3 experiments, to make decisions about the identity of line segment patterns after either adding or subtracting line segments from the original pattern. On some of the trials, the line segments from the initial display were presented again in the second display to minimize the necessity of remembering early information during the processing of later information. Although this manipulation presumably reduced the importance of memory in the tasks, it had little effect on the magnitude of the age differences in any of the experiments. Because the 2 groups were equivalent in accuracy of …