Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Contributors
- 1 Introduction
- PART I FOUNDATIONS
- PART II METHODOLOGIES
- PART III THE NATURE OF KNOWLEDGE
- 14 Case-Based Reasoning
- 15 The Knowledge Integration Perspective on Learning and Instruction
- 16 A History of Conceptual Change Research
- 17 Spatial Representations and Imagery in Learning
- 18 Literacy and the Learning Sciences
- PART IV MAKING KNOWLEDGE VISIBLE
- PART V LEARNING TOGETHER
- PART VI LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS
- Afterword: After How Comes What
- Epilogue: The Fundamental Issue in the Learning Sciences
- Author Index
- Subject Index
- References
17 - Spatial Representations and Imagery in Learning
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
Edited by
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Contributors
- 1 Introduction
- PART I FOUNDATIONS
- PART II METHODOLOGIES
- PART III THE NATURE OF KNOWLEDGE
- 14 Case-Based Reasoning
- 15 The Knowledge Integration Perspective on Learning and Instruction
- 16 A History of Conceptual Change Research
- 17 Spatial Representations and Imagery in Learning
- 18 Literacy and the Learning Sciences
- PART IV MAKING KNOWLEDGE VISIBLE
- PART V LEARNING TOGETHER
- PART VI LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS
- Afterword: After How Comes What
- Epilogue: The Fundamental Issue in the Learning Sciences
- Author Index
- Subject Index
- References
Summary
Spatial representations, when used well, support learning in reading, mathematics, and science. They also enable mental simulations and visualizations that prompt innovation and scientific discovery. Spatial representations, both external drawings and internal images, exploit people's sophisticated perceptual-motor system. The embodiment of thought in perceptual processes has promising implications for learning. In this chapter, we emphasize spatial representations that people construct and transform in their mind's eye. The process of working with these mental spatial representations is called imagery.
Spatial representation is different from other forms of cognitive representation studied by learning scientists – linguistic, conceptual, logical – because spatial representations partake of perceptual processes and experiences. Neurological evidence, for example, indicates that perceptual regions of the brain activate when people imagine movement (Kosslyn, 1994). Yet, spatial representations are not mere echoes of perception. They can integrate nonperceptual knowledge that allows people to imagine things they have not seen. Spatial representations have four key properties that determine their unique value for education. We begin with a brief review of early psychological research on spatial memory, and then describe the four key properties. We show how these properties can be used to help people learn about the world through mental models and simulations. Afterward, we discuss ways to help people leverage imagery to innovate new ideas and scientific insight.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences , pp. 283 - 298Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005
References
, & (1993). Gesture-speech mismatch and mechanisms of learning: What the hands reveal about a child's state of mind. Cognitive Psychology, 25, 468–523.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, & (1989). The role of experience in spatial test performance: A meta-analysis. Sex Roles, 20, 327–344.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1991). The mind behind the musical ear: How children develop musical intelligence. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Biswas, G., Schwartz, D. L., Bransford, J. D., & TAG-V. (2001). Technology support for complex problem solving: From SAD environments to AI. In & (Eds.), Smart machines in education (pp. 71–98). Menlo Park, CA: AAAI/MIT Press.Google Scholar
, , & (1975). Comprehension and memory for pictures. Memory & Cognition, 3, 216–220.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, , & (1972). Sentence memory: A constructive versus interpretive approach. Cognitive Psychology, 3, 193–209.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bransford, J. D., Franks, J. J., Vye, N. J., & Sherwood, R. D. (1989). New approaches to instruction: Because wisdom can't be told. In & (Eds.), Similarity and analogical reasoning (pp. 470–497). New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1968). Spatial and verbal components of the act of recall. Canadian Journal of Psychology, 22, 349–368.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (1985). Can mental images be ambiguous? Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 11, 317–28.Google Scholar
Clement, J. (1994). Use of physical intuition and imagistic simulation in expert problem solving. In (Eds.), Implicit and explicit knowledge. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.Google Scholar
, , , & (1991). Inventing graphing: Metarepresentational expertise in children. Journal of Mathematical Behavior, 10, 117–16.Google Scholar
, , (1994). Orientation invariance and geometric primitives in shape recognition. Cognitive Science, 18, 325–344.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1990). Creative imagery: Discoveries and inventions in visualization. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
(1962). Observations on active touch. Psychological Review, 69, 477–491.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, & (1955). Perceptual learning: Differentiation or enrichment. Psychological Review, 62, 32–41.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, , , , & (2004). Activity and imagined activity can enhance young children's reading comprehension. Journal of Educational Psychology, 96, 424–436.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1992). Mental animation: Inferring motion from static diagrams of mechanical systems. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 18, 1084–1102.Google ScholarPubMed
Hegarty, M. (2000). Capacity limits in diagrammatic reasoning. In , , & (Eds.). Theory and application of diagrams. Berlin: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(2004). External Representations as Insights to Cognition: Production and Comprehension of Text and Diagrams in Instructions. Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, Stanford University.Google Scholar
, , , & (1989). Can you squeeze a tomato? The role of motor representations in semantic sensibility judgments. Journal of Memory & Language, 28, 56–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1994). Image and brain: The resolution of the imagery debate. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
, , & (1993). Intuitive physics in action and judgment: The development of knowledge about projectile motion. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 19, 952–966.Google Scholar
, & (1987). Why a diagram is (sometimes) worth ten thousand words. Cognitive Science, 11, 65–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (1982). The mental representation of spatial descriptions. Memory & Cognition 10, 181–187.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, & (in press). Physically distributed learning: Adapting and reinterpreting physical environments in the development of fraction concepts. Cognitive Science.Google Scholar
McCloskey, M. (1983) Naive theories of motion. In and (Eds.), Mental models, (pp. 229–324). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
, & (1988). Interpreting words in spatial descriptions. Language and Cognitive Processes, 3, 275–292.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, , & (1987). Accessibility and situation models in narrative comprehension. Journal of Memory and Language, 26, 165–187.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (2000). An investigation of teachers' beliefs of students' algebra development. Cognition and Instruction, 18, 209–237.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (1979). Long-term memory for a common object. Cognitive Psychology, 11, 287–307.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1986). Mental representations: A dual coding approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
(1987). Imagined spatial transformations of one's hands and feet. Cognitive Psychology 19, 178–24.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, , & (1994). Imagery, action, and young children's spatial orientation. It's not being there that counts, it's what one has in mind. Child Development, 65, 1262–1278.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (1987). A case of viewer-centered object perception. Cognitive Psychology, 19, 280–293.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
(2004). Creative teaching: Collaborative discussion as disciplined improvisation. Educational Researcher, 33(2), 12–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schoenfeld, A. (1992) Learning to think mathematically: Problem solving, metacognition and sense making in mathematics. In (Ed.), Handbook of research on mathematics thinking and learning (pp. 334–370). New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
(1993). The construction and analogical transfer of symbolic visualizations. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 30, 1309–1325.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (1996). Shuttling between depictive models and abstract rules: Induction and fallback. Cognitive Science, 20, 457–497.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (1999). Inferences through imagined actions: knowing by simulated doing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 25, 116–136.Google Scholar
Schwartz, D. L., Blair, K. P., Biswas, G., Leelawong, K., & Davis, J. (in press). Animations of thought: Interactivity in the teachable agent paradigm. To appear in & (Eds.), Learning with animation: Research and implications for design. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Schwartz, D. L., Bransford, J. D., & Sears, D. L. (2005). Efficiency and innovation in transfer. (in press). In (Ed.), Transfer of learning from a modern multidisciplinary persepctive. Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.Google Scholar
, & (2000). Tool use and the effect of action on the imagination. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Cognition, and Memory, 26, 1655–1665.Google ScholarPubMed
, & (2001). Visual memories from non-visual experiences. Psychological Science, 12, 343–347.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1967). Recognition memory for words, sentences and pictures. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 6, 156–163.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (1998). Perceiving real-world viewpoint changes. Psychological Science, 9, 315–320.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(1973). Learning 10,000 pictures. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 25, 207–222.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, & (1978). Distortions in judged spatial relations. Cognitive Psychology, 10, 422–437.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
, & (1997). What do architects and students perceive in their design sketches? A protocol analysis. Design Studies, 18, 385–403.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wertheimer, M. (1938). Laws of organization in perceptual forms. In (Ed.), A sourcebook of gestalt psychology, (pp. 71–88). New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, & (2001). Movement prediction and movement production. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27, 48–64.Google ScholarPubMed
, & (1998). Mental and manual rotation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 24, 397–412.Google ScholarPubMed
Zwaan, R. A. (2004). The immersed experiencer: toward an embodied theory of language comprehension. In (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation, Vol. 43 (pp. 35–62). New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
, & (1998). Situation models in language comprehension and memory. Psychological Bulletin, 123, 162–185.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
- 16
- Cited by