The primary focus of this study examines the effectiveness of the CRIOSAT (Computerized Rotational Isometric and Orthographic Spatial) spatial ability treatment on a random sample of middle school students’ (n=137) spatial ability as measured by the Purdue Spatial Visualization Test: Rotations Test (PSVT-ROT) (Guay, 1977). The secondary focus of this study investigates the relationships between mathematical achievement, problem solving preferences, and spatial ability. The secondary focus was tested on a subsample (n=41), with the problem solving preferences measured via the Mathematical Processing Instrument (MPI) (Suwarsono, 1982). Findings indicated no significant gains in spatial ability scores after students’ use of the CRIOSAT treatment; while some increases in spatial ability took place in males. Significant positive correlation was identified between mathematics achievement and spatial ability; while conversely, a significant negative correlation was found between mathematics achievement and level of visual problem solving used by students.

The present study investigated whether spatial ability is correlated with the ability to accurately recognize faces. A samp~e pf 36 undergraduates were recruited for this study. Participants completed two measures of spatial ability: The Purdue Visualization of Rotations Test as a measure of mental rotation and the Object Location Memory Test as a measure of memory for the location of objects in relation to one another. Facial recognition was measured usipg the Cambridge Face Metnory Test, which measures the recognition of faces in both upright and inverted positions. As predicted, a significant relationship was found between mental rotation and inverted facial recognition, r = .33,p < .05. There was not a significant relationship between object location memory and upright facial recognition, r=.07,p > .05. Interestingly, upright facial recognition was more closely associated with mental rotation, though the relationship did not reach statistical significance r = .24,p > .05. There was not a significant relationship between overall spatial ability and overall facial recognition, r = .17,p > .05. The traditional gender differences were found oh spatial ability such that males outperformed females on mental rotation (Males: M= 12.73, SD= 3.93; Females: M= 9.32, SD= 4.11) and females outperformed males on object location memory (Females: M= 18.80, SD= 5.53; Males: M= 14.09,_ SD= 8.19). A significant gender difference on facial recognition such that females outperform males was not found, which contradicts findings from past J research (McBain, Norton, & Chen, 2009). These results suggest that mental rotation is an important factor in human facial recognition.

This study provides a qualitative examination of the role of visualization through an understanding of the thought processes that occur during visualization when Grade 9 learners engage in data handling and spatial tasks. Data were gathered in a problem-centred context from learners' written responses in order to determine the students' visuality. Visuality is defined as how often learners used visualization. In addition interviews were conducted with the learners who described the thought processes that they engaged in during visualization while involved in problem solving. The role of visualization was highlighted through the processes that learners described during the interviews. The tasks which provided manipulative materials helped learners create visual images which promoted the process of visualization. Certain recommendations were made. Knowledge of the role of visualization enables the educator to encourage the use of visualization during the teaching of mathematics. / Educational Studies / M.Ed. (Mathematical Education)

This study provides a qualitative examination of the role of visualization through an understanding of the thought processes that occur during visualization when Grade 9 learners engage in data handling and spatial tasks. Data were gathered in a problem-centred context from learners' written responses in order to determine the students' visuality. Visuality is defined as how often learners used visualization. In addition interviews were conducted with the learners who described the thought processes that they engaged in during visualization while involved in problem solving. The role of visualization was highlighted through the processes that learners described during the interviews. The tasks which provided manipulative materials helped learners create visual images which promoted the process of visualization. Certain recommendations were made. Knowledge of the role of visualization enables the educator to encourage the use of visualization during the teaching of mathematics. / Educational Studies / M.Ed. (Mathematical Education)

There is a continual challenge within the construction industry to meet schedule, budget, and quality expectations. At the same time, there is an underlying problem where the older and more experienced workforce is retiring from industry at a faster rate than the newer workforce can replace them. As the more experienced workforce departs from the industry, they are taking with them much-needed skills and experience that fail to get transitioned to the newer and less experienced workforce. Among these skills are spatial skills. The construction industry has already caught on that this is a serious problem that they must contend with, and so, they have looked to the postsecondary institutions to help resolve it. However, the postsecondary institutions have a problem of their own, whereby they commonly default to passive teaching techniques that are not well suited to teaching spatial skills. So, therefore, there is a need to graduate construction management students with better spatial skills in order to meet the necessities of industry. Along with this, is the need for academia to reconsider teaching styles to better train spatial skills. Spatial skills, it has been found, are better retained when active and collaborative teaching engagements are arranged. Therefore, identifying and testing a practical and non-interfering classroom tool that students can easily use, would be the most favorable way to overcome academia’s tendency towards passive teaching. Spatial skills are needed in every part of the construction industry. In fact, everyday simple tasks require spatial skills and while these skills are honed over time, more refined skills, capable of interpreting abstract space, are required to assemble a complex construction project. Construction projects are getting more complex and often the design involves some measure of abstract thinking. Teaching these abstract-based spatial skills in postsecondary institutions has typically been done through drafting and plan reading courses, with some success. However, the need from industry is not being fully met with these skills and so an alternative solution is recommended. While Building Information Modeling (BIM) has become an adequate solution to aid in the understanding and planning of highly abstract designs, successfully using it requires excellent spatial skills. Consequently, it would be advantageous if those spatial skills were developed before students were introduced to BIM. Augmented reality is a collection of technologies that allows a user to view the “real” world with additional information that is intended to provide a better understanding of what is being observed. Augmented reality already has applications in many industries and is fast becoming a proven technology. With the availability of smaller and more powerful consumer mobile devices, augmented reality has the potential of becoming a more ubiquitous and practical tool. Recognizing that this technology can be practical, non-interfering, and known by the masses makes it an excellent solution for the classroom. Therefore, this research will study the use of an augmented reality tool to determine if there is an improvement of spatial skills in terms of accuracy, time to execute, and the retention of concepts over time. Furthermore, a separate analysis will be conducted to determine if the teaching tool is a benefit or disruption to the overall learning experience.

published_or_final_version / abstract / Education / Master / Master of Education

In both the private and work spheres, multitasking among three or more activities has become and is continuing to evolve as a pervasive element of everyday life, and recent technological advances only seem to be exacerbating the process. Despite attempts to understand the mental processes that let humans successfully multitask, little is known about the functional cognitive level at which these mental processes take place. This thesis makes a case for the involvement of spatial ability (among other cognitive abilities) in successful multitasking behavior. It focuses on the importance of the cognitive off-loading of executive control demands onto spatial ability, due to the inherent complexity of relationships between task goals and deadlines in multitasking scenarios. Importantly, it presents a working hypothesis—the spatiotemporal hypothesis of multitasking—as a tool for making specific predictions about multitasking performance, based on individual and sex differences in spatial ability. In Study 1, individual differences in spatial ability and executive functions emerged as independent predictors of multitasking performance. When spatial ability was decomposed into its subcomponents, only the coordinate (metric), but not categorical (nonmetric), processing of spatial relations was related to multitasking performance. Males outperformed females in both spatial ability and multitasking, and the effects were moderated by menstrual changes, in that sex differences in coordinate spatial processing and multitasking were observed between males and females in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle, but not between males and females at menses. In Study II, multitasking performance reflected age- and sex-related differences in executive functioning and spatial ability, suggesting that executive functions contribute to multitasking performance across the adult life span, and that reliance on spatial skills for coordinating deadlines is reduced with advancing age. The results of Study III, in which the spatiotemporal hypothesis was directly scrutinized, suggest that the spatial disruption of multiple deadlines interferes with multitasking performance. Overall, these findings suggest that multitasking performance, under certain conditions, reflects independent contributions of spatial ability and executive functioning. Moreover, the results support the distinction between categorical and coordinate spatial processing, suggesting that these two basic relational processes are selectively affected by female sex hormones and are differentially effective, even across the age span, in transforming and handling temporal patterns as spatial relations in the context of multitasking. Finally, fluctuations of sex hormones exhibit a modulating effect on sex differences in spatial ability and multitasking performance. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following paper was unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 3: Manuscript.</p>

Investigations of children's spatial ability have typically looked at performance on laboratory tasks, and none have examined differences between learning disabled and non-learning disabled children. The present study surveyed sixty-seven parents of third and sixth grade children about the types of spatial activities children engage in everyday. Parents of learning disabled and non-learning disabled children were included. Results provided information about the types of spatial activities children engage in and the relationships between participation and performance. Major findings included differences between learning disabled and non-learning disabled children in navigational ability and in the strategies employed in difficult or ambiguous spatial situations. Findings were discussed in terms of the influence learning disabled children's negative self evaluations have on their performance.

空間能力被許多智力理論學者認為是人類智能的重要因素之一，並且認為此能力的高低與抽象思考、數理、科學、繪圖能力…等有密切的關係。此外，空間能力可激發空間創造力，並延伸到其他的領域形成獨特的創造力。本研究嘗試將虛擬實境技術應用在加強國小高年級學童的空間能力上。首先，依據學者對空間能力的研究及虛擬實境技術的特性，開發一套可以加強積木旋轉能力的三度空間物體操控軟體。在針對國小高年級學童進行二週的訓練之後，採用前後測的方式驗證此虛擬實境三度空間物體操控軟體的學習成效。最後再以問卷調查的方式，分析此軟體對受試者學習情況之影響。 　　整個軟體經過規劃、分析與設計、實作及應用等階段後，以前測及後測的得分作單因子共變數分析。統計結果為：MSTR/MSE=4.4416 > F0.05=4.0980，表示接受本研究所開發之三度空間物體操控軟體訓練的國小高年級學童，其積木旋轉能力有顯著的增強。

This study addresses the criticism leveled at A.C.T. Mathematics teachers with regard to their failure to use any other method of teaching than chalk-and-talk. By considering the changed needs of society for mathematics and the changed perceptions by society of education, the criticism is placed in context. The importance of spatial ability for mathematics is examined in the context of theories of cognitive abilities and its current under utilization within the classroom. On the basis of the increased need to utilize more talent the study was designed to operationalise in the classroom the constructs of simultaneous and successive synthesis, derived from Luria's model of brain functioning. The question of gender differences in mathematics achievment and spatial ability is addressed. The possible role of the maturation of language in determining differences in the acquistion of ability to form simultaneous synthesis is briefly discussed. The study was designed to utilize and enhance simultaneous synthesis. By demonstrating an Aptitude-Treatment Interaction it was intended to confirm that students, who function at a high level in simultaneous synthesis but at a low level in successive synthesis, would achieve more with experience with spatial activates than in a more traditional chalk-and-talk classroom. Gender differences in achievement were not found. Gender differences in successive/simultaneous profiles were found in accordance with theory predictions. The need for the duration of longer treatment periods is briefly discussed in the context of funding and the appearance of greater efficiency of traditional teaching methods when the students are functioning at the highest level of symbolic thought.