Search

Summary Can realistic spatial scenarios be used to measure spatial mental imagery? Can people accurately evaluate their spatial imagery? Does gender moderate the relationship between performance on realistic spatial imagery tasks and ratings of imagery realism? Forty-two female and 31 male undergraduates first rated the realism of their images after reading spatial scenarios based on actual spatial tasks. In phase 2, they solved closely related spatial scenario problems, and then completed the VZ-2 Paper Folding test. Performance on realistic spatial scenarios predicted performance on the VZ-2. Men's evaluation of their spatial imagery realism predicted their actual spatial performance, but women's did not. More task experience was positively related to more realistic images and higher scores on the VZ-2. These results were generally consistent with those found with more artificial stimulus materials, but also demonstrated the importance of considering gender differences in spatial problem strategy and/or rating scale interpretation. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Instructional metaphors scaffold learning better when accompanied by an elaboration. Applying structure mapping theory, we developed and used an elaborated instructional metaphor (text and illustrations) for introductory chemistry concepts. In two studies (N 1 = 44, N 2 = 57), college students with little chemistry background read either the elaborated metaphor, sub‐concept metaphor statements (e.g. an atom is like a tile) only or (Study 2) sub‐concept labels (e.g. atom) only. When asked to write what they knew about the sub‐concept, those in the elaborated metaphor condition wrote more sophisticated domain inferences than those in the other condition(s), p < .05. The elaborated metaphor helped participants construct accurate pre‐conceptual mental models that could prepare them for future learning (i.e. acquisition of new knowledge). The results also suggested that acquisition of high‐level concepts may require active learner transactions with the analogue, as can be had in interactive instructional game ...

Participants read a procedural text describing how to make a wind-up spool toy while only reading, reading and watching the experimenter do the task, or reading and doing the task themselves. Afterward, task performance (measured by time to complete the task without the instructions and number of errors) and memory for/understanding of the text (measured with a Multiple Choice Test) were assessed. Participants then completed a packet that included the Need for Cognition and Boredom Proneness scales. Task performance was better under the Read & Do and Read & Watch conditions, indicating that those participants were more engaged in the task than Read Only. Need for Cognition was positively related to Multiple Choice Test score (after controlling for boredom proneness and task experience) only under the Read & Do conditions (and marginally for Read & Watch). This suggests that level of task engagement may moderate the relationship between need for cognition and test performance. The Boredom Proneness subscales of Perception of Time and Affective Responses were negatively related to need for cognition.

Processing speed subtests are components of widely used intellectual assessment instruments. Many researchers interpret these measures as assessing a unitary construct, but there is a question concerning the constructs assessed by these measures and, ultimately, their interpretative utility. Coding and Symbol Search from the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Third Edition (Wechsler, 1991), Visual Matching and Cross Out from the Woodcock Johnson Tests of Cognitive Ability-Revised (Woodcock & Johnson, 1989), and Speed of Information Processing from the Differential Ability Scales (Elliott, 1990) were administered to 102 volunteer participants. Using regression analyses, performance on each of these tests was predicted by motor speed and/or number facility factors. Individual differences in motor speed were found to be related to each of the five processing speed measures, whereas number facility was related to three of the measures.

This research tested the relationship between text structural variables (on vs. off the causal chain, active vs. static information, and hierarchical structure) and reader perceptions, reading time, and true-false performance for procedural texts. Twenty-four college-age participants each read 3 procedural texts. As predicted, sentences that were (a) on the causal chain, (b) active, and (c) associated with task steps were read more slowly and judged to be more important (p < .05). The results were similar to those previously found with narratives, except for the hierarchical structure variable. Also as predicted, text differences were found such that as the variation in the type of information contained in the text increased, relationships with the structural variables increased.

This experiment tested the effect that purpose for reading or instructional set has on reading rates, recall, and task performance for procedural text. It also tested whether comprehension models proposed by Kintsch and van Dijk (1978) and Trabasso and Sperry (1985) are predictive of text processing for procedural text. Forty‐eight college students read text for one of two purposes: (a) to perform the task described by the text (Read‐to‐Do), or (b) to recall the text (Read‐to‐Recall). Participants read one of two procedural texts for two reading trials. The results showed that, as predicted, Read‐to‐Do participants performed the task better and Read‐to‐Recall participants recalled the text better. In addition, Read‐to‐Do participants recalled less of the information judged to be less important for performing the task than Read‐to‐Recall participants. Reading rate varied as a function of high and low importance of the information to task performance and varied more for the Read‐to‐Do participants than for ...

We examined the effects of placing perceived distance and perceived similarity, the two critical aspects of assimilation and contrast, in conflict. In a two-phase experiment, 115 subjects twice indicated their position on imposing the death penalty on convicted rapists. In Phase 2, they indicated their view after hearing a position moderately opposed to their own and a position extremely supportive of their own. A change in position was indicated by a difference in subjects' Phase 1 and Phase 2 scores. The hypothesis that subjects who originally held moderate positions would forsake these positions and assimilate a position moderately opposed to their own in Phase 2 was confirmed, suggesting that perceived distance is more important than perceived difference for those with moderate views. In addition, the movement of more extreme groups was found to regress toward moderation.

Two models of text comprehension, a referential model proposed by Kintsch and van Dijk (1978) and a causal model proposed by Trabasso and Sperry (1985), were tested in two experiments with eight procedural texts. In Experiment 1, 24 female college students rated the importance of propositions, idea units, and sentences to the overall procedure described in the texts on a 7‐point scale. In Experiment 2, 16 female college students recalled each of the eight texts immediately after reading it. Predictors derived from the models were used to predict the ratings and the recall in multiple regression analyses. The results showed that the amount of variance accounted for by the predictors varied from text to text. For the ratings, the causal model accounted for significantly more variance than the referential model. For the recall, the causal model generally accounted for more variance but the difference was not significant. For the referential model, level within the hierarchy accounted for the most variance an...

Two experiments investigated the effect of visual display coherence and simultaneous presentation of visual displays and stories on detailed recognition memory for the presented information. In Experiment 1, 54 subjects were exposed to a visual display and/or a story; the displays varied in coherence. In Experiment 2, the least unified visual displays were modified to be more comparable to the other display types. In both experiments, subjects showed the best memory for visual display detail when the display was least coherent. Story Only subjects showed better story memory than did Visual Display + Story subjects when the accompanying display was less coherent. Visual Display + Story subjects showed the best story memory and the best visual display/story matching performance when the display was most coherent. The results suggest that unification has a detrimental effect on memory for detail and a trade-off of processing resources occurs when visual task demands are high.

Two theories of priming were compared: spreading activation theories, in particular ACT* (J. R. Anderson, 1983), and compound-cue theories (R. Ratcliff & G. McKoon, 1988). Whereas ACT* assumes that priming is a result of diffusing activation in long-term memory, compound-cue models suggest that priming results from a formation process of prime and target in short-term memory. Thirty-eight participants took part in a study that combined a digit span task with a double lexical decision task consisting of a prime and a target item. Digit span length (low, medium, and high) and prime type (related or unrelated word or nonword) were both within-subject variables. As expected, results showed significant priming effects. In favor of ACT*, no interaction between digit span length and prime type was found. Additionally, a nonword inhibition effect (unrelated versus nonword prime) was found, which was predicted by compound-cue theories. This finding is discussed in terms of the process interference and res...

In two experiments, subjects interacted to different extents with relevant devices while reading two complex multistep procedural texts and were then tested with task performance time, true/false, and recall measures. While reading, subjects performed the task (read and do), saw the experimenter perform the task (read and see experimenter do), imagined doing the task (read and imagine), looked at the device while reading (read and see), or only read (read only). Van Dijk and Kintsch's (1983) text representation theory led to the prediction that exposure to the task device (in the read-and-do, read-and-see, and read-and-see-experimenter-do conditions) would lead to the development of a stronger situation model and therefore faster task performance, whereas the read-only and read-and-see conditions would lead to a better textbase, and therefore better performance on the true/false and recall tasks. Paivio's (1991) dual coding theory led to the opposite prediction for recall. The results supported the text representation theory with task performance and recall. The read-and-see condition produced consistently good performance on the true/false measure. Amount of text study time contributed to recall performance. These findings support the notion that information available while reading leads to differential development of representations in memory, which, in turn, causes differences in performance on various measures.

The effect of information activated during encoding on subsequent recognition and cued recall was investigated. Subjects were shown a series of weakly related word pairs and were instructed to remember the word that appeared in capital letters and to look for a relationship between the two words. Four types of distractor words were used in recognition: related to both cue and target, related to target only, related to cue only, and unrelated. The results indicated that correct rejections decreased as relatedness to the target increased. In cued recall, performance decreased as the number of words that were associatively linked to both the cue and target words increased. Both of these outcomes are thought to reflect information activated at the time of encoding.