Conference Paper

Spatial Encoding Strategy Theory: The Relationship between Spatial Skill and STEM Achievement

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Abstract

Learners' spatial skill is a reliable and significant predictor of achievement in STEM, including computing, education. Spatial skill is also malleable, meaning it can be improved through training. Most cognitive skill training improves performance on only a narrow set of similar tasks, but researchers have found ample evidence that spatial training can broadly improve STEM achievement. We do not yet know the cognitive mechanisms that make spatial skill training broadly transferable when other cognitive training is not, but understanding these mechanisms is important for developing training and instruction that consistently benefits learners, especially those starting with low spatial skill. This paper proposes the spatial encoding strategy (SpES) theory to explain the cognitive mechanisms connecting spatial skill and STEM achievement. To motivate SpES theory, the paper reviews research from STEM education, learning sciences, and psychology. SpES theory provides compelling post hoc explanations for the findings from this literature and aligns with neuroscience models about the functions of brain structures. The paper concludes with a plan for testing the theory's validity and using it to inform future research and instruction. The paper focuses on implications for computing education, but the transferability of spatial skill to STEM performance makes the proposed theory relevant to many education communities.

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... The National Research Council stated that spatial ability plays an important role in problem-solving and reasoning in science [7]. Margulieux also expressed a similar view that spatial abilities need to be mastered to ensure success in the STEM fields, especially in chemistry [8]. Students must be able to understand, interpret, and translate submicroscopic representations at the level of particles such as atoms and molecules. ...
... In addition, [7] stated that spatial abilities play an important role in problem-solving and reasoning in science. Aligned with that view, [8] considered that spatial skills need to be mastered for success in STEM fields. For example, chemistry students must learn about the three-dimensional structure of molecules, and students who study geology must understand the underlying structures of geomorphologic features of the earth, visualize the internal structures of the Earth, understand the chemical composition of rocks and minerals, interpret the spatial arrangement of topical features, and understand the geometries of buried tectonic plates and faults. ...
... In this context, students already had some spatial abilities, however, they were not well honed. Margulieux reasoned that this gap in understanding is reduced when the spatial abilities of students are the result of a long learning and training process [8]. If viewed from the perspective of educational psychology, as explained by Jamaris [64], the cognitive development phase for high school students is included in the formal operations phase. ...
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... We now turn to a discussion of Spatial Reasoning and its neurological representations. Spatial Reasoning refers to an individual's general ability to mentally manipulate objects and encompasses skills such as mental rotation, mental folding, pattern recognition, and spatial perception [24]. Spatial reasoning has been shown to correlate with performance in a variety of activities including mathematics [25], [26], general engineering [27], and programming [28], [29]. ...
... For the latter, we observe that a number of theories and hypotheses about how humans learn various subjects, from second languages [59] to musical instruments [60], have been posited in the literature. We believe that it will be fruitful to investigate whether a sequential model or a more spatial encoding strategy (see Margulieux [24]) best describes learning to program. Based on our results, our preliminary speculation is that spatial encoding is indeed a key general strategy employed by novices that may decrease in importance over time. ...
... Cooper et al. and Bockmon et al. ran studies with high school and university programmers, finding that those who participated in additional spatial training performed better on a final programming test [62], [65]. Margulieux's spatial encoding strategy (SpES) framework relates the cogitative processes behind spatial ability and learning to program [24]. SpES hypothesizes that strong spatial reasoning ability helps novice programmers use general strategies for mentally encoding non-verbal information. ...
Preprint
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... CS Education researchers have attempted to model these cognitive functional similarities, which resulted in a plethora of theories. For instance, Margulieux et al. [25] proposed the Spatial Encoding Strategy (SpES), a theory behind the transfer-ability between spatial ability and programming, whereby developing spatial skills aided in acquiring generalisable strategies to form mental representations of nonverbal information [25]. ...
... CS Education researchers have attempted to model these cognitive functional similarities, which resulted in a plethora of theories. For instance, Margulieux et al. [25] proposed the Spatial Encoding Strategy (SpES), a theory behind the transfer-ability between spatial ability and programming, whereby developing spatial skills aided in acquiring generalisable strategies to form mental representations of nonverbal information [25]. ...
Preprint
Previous works from research and industry have proposed a spatial representation of code in a canvas, arguing that a navigational code space confers developers the freedom to organise elements according to their understanding. By allowing developers to translate logical relatedness into spatial proximity, this code representation could aid in code navigation and comprehension. However, the association between developers' code comprehension and their visuo-spatial mental model of the code is not yet well understood. This mental model is affected on the one hand by the spatial code representation and on the other by the visuo-spatial working memory of developers. We address this knowledge gap by conducting an online experiment with 20 developers following a between-subject design. The control group used a conventional tab-based code visualization, while the experimental group used a code canvas to complete three code comprehension tasks. Furthermore, we measure the participants' visuo-spatial working memory using a Corsi Block test at the end of the tasks. Our results suggest that, overall, neither the spatial representation of code nor the visuo-spatial working memory of developers has a significant impact on comprehension performance. However, we identified significant differences in the time dedicated to different comprehension activities such as navigation, annotation, and UI interactions.
... The PSVT:R is a timed test that requires test-takers to mentally rotate 3D objects based on 2D illustrations of varying complexity, requiring both the ability to visualize the object and hold it in short-term memory (Bodner and Guay,1997). High PSVT:R scores have been shown to predict success in a wide variety of undergraduate STEM courses, including chemistry, physics, math, engineering, geology, geometry, medicine, dentistry, and radiology, as spatial problem-solving is required across these subjects (Liu et al, 2021;Margulieux, 2019;Berkowitz and Stern 2018;). It is not well understood, however, whether this relates to the same visual-spatial ability is required for establishing mental models used in the biological sciences (Milner-Bolotin and Nashon, 2012). ...
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Visual-spatial reasoning has been considered a predictor of performance success in STEM courses, including engineering, chemistry, biology, and mathematics. However, little is known about whether visual-spatial ability predicts success for non-STEM students in general education neuroscience courses. In the following study, we investigate how scores on tests of visual-spatial object rotation relate to student performance on illustrative and content exams in a large non-major undergraduate neuropharmacology course. To help students understand content visually, the course provided students with homework assignments that allowed them to create illustrations of lecture content using the online scientific illustration software, BioRender. Findings suggest that percent completion of BioRender assignments was a greater predictor of student performance than tests of innate visual-spatial ability. In addition, we show that visual learning style preference was not correlated with visual-spatial ability, as measured by the Purdue Spatial Visualization Test-Visualization of Rotations. Neither did learning style preference predict student success. The following paper suggests practice illustrating neuroscience concepts, or perhaps content practice in general, had a greater impact on student learning independent of learning style preference or innate visual-spatial ability.
... According to Margulieux [16], spatial reasoning "is the mental processing of spatial, non-verbal information" (p. 82), such as mental rotations and translations of objects. ...
... Sorby also developed a spatial training intervention aimed at middle school students [20] and reported better performance in introductory programming for students taking part in the training program. These studies show that a students' spatial ability is malleable and spatial skills can be learned [21]. However, additional classes that only a subset of student is required to attend may be perceived as remedial. ...
... Previous research has shown a correlation between spatial reasoning skills and success in STEM education including computing [3,23,26]. In contrast to many other types of intelligence, spatial skills are malleable and training them can improve educational outcomes. ...
... Two theories for the relationship between spatial skills and computing have been published. Both Parkinson and Cutts [10] and Margulieux [7] propose that spatial skills are not strictly necessary for succeeding in computing-or STEM-but that they do help. Both theories present the idea that spatial skills develop abstract skills that are valuable in tackling general problems and tasks associated with STEM fields. ...
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A framework for cognitive spaces Ever since Tolman's proposal of cognitive maps in the 1940s, the question of how spatial representations support flexible behavior has been a contentious topic. Bellmund et al. review and combine concepts from cognitive science and philosophy with findings from neurophysiology of spatial navigation in rodents to propose a framework for cognitive neuroscience. They argue that spatial-processing principles in the hippocampalentorhinal region provide a geometric code to map information domains of cognitive spaces for high-level cognition and discuss recent evidence for this proposal. Science , this issue p. eaat6766
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Spatial cognition has long been the subject of research in psychology and education. Individual differences in spatial ability have been found between males and females. In this study, a test of spatial cognition was administered to >3000 first-year engineering students over a five-year period. Students were divided into experimental and control groups based on a pass/fail cutoff score on the spatial test. Students who failed the test were all assigned to a 1-credit spatial skills intervention course that met for one session per week over a semester; those who passed the test were assigned to the control group. A regression discontinuity analysis was used to determine the effectiveness of the intervention. A treatment effect was found for performance in a variety of introductory courses and STEM GPAs, with a particularly positive effect in Engineering Problem Solving and Analysis. These effects were found through a discontinuity at the cutoff score, with the intervention group performing at higher levels than would be expected if they had not participated in the intervention. Retention data was also examined, and it was found that the intervention had a positive impact on the retention of women in engineering. The results of this study suggest that spatial skills instruction can also be used as a key component for improving gender diversity in the STEM fields - beyond improving course performance.
Article
Spatial cognition has long been the subject of research in psychology and education. Individual differences in spatial ability have been found between males and females. In this study, a test of spatial cognition was administered to more than 3000 first-year engineering students over a five-year period. Students were divided into experimental and control groups based on a pass/fail cutoff score on the spatial test. Students who failed the test were all assigned to a 1-credit spatial skills intervention course that met for one session per week over a semester; those who passed the test were assigned to the control group. A regression discontinuity analysis was used to determine the effectiveness of the intervention. A treatment effect was found for performance in a variety of introductory courses and STEM GPAs, with a particularly positive effect in Engineering Problem Solving and Analysis. These effects were found through a discontinuity at the cutoff score, with the intervention group performing at higher levels than would be expected if they had not participated in the intervention. Retention data was also examined, and it was found that the intervention had a positive impact on the retention of women in engineering. The results of this study suggest that spatial skills instruction can also be used as a key component for improving gender diversity in the STEM fields - beyond improving course performance.
Conference Paper
Socioeconomic status (SES) has a measurable impact on many educational outcomes and likely also influences computer science (CS) achievement. We present a novel model to account for the observed connections between SES and CS achievement. We examined possible mediating variables between SES and CS achievement, including spatial ability and access to computing. We define access as comprised of measurements of prior learning opportunities for computing, perceptions of computer science, and encouragement to pursue computing. The factors (SES, spatial ability, access to computing, and CS achievement) were measured through surveys completed by 163 students in introductory computing courses at a college level. Through the use of exploratory structural equation modeling, we found that these variables do impact each other, though not as we originally hypothesized. For our sample of students, we found spatial ability was a mediating variable for SES and CS achievement, but access to computing was not. Neither model explained all the variance, and our subject pool of US college students had higher than average SES. Our findings suggest that SES does influence success in computer science, but that relationship may not be due to access to computing education opportunities. Rather, SES might be influencing variables such as spatial ability which in turn influence CS performance.
Conference Paper
A primary goal of computing education research is to discover designs that produce better learning of computing. In this pursuit, we have increasingly drawn upon theories from learning science and education research, recognizing the potential benefits of optimizing our search for better designs by leveraging the predictions of general theories of learning. In this paper, we contribute an argument that theory can also inhibit our community's search for better designs. We present three inhibitions: 1) our desire to both advance explanatory theory and advance design splits our attention, which prevents us from excelling at both; 2) our emphasis on applying and refining general theories of learning is done at the expense of domain-specific theories of computer science knowledge, and 3) our use of theory as a critical lens in peer review prevents the publication of designs that may accelerate design progress. We present several recommendations for how to improve our use of theory, viewing it as just one of many sources of design insight in pursuit of improving learning of computing.
Conference Paper
Prior research has shown that spatial abilities are crucial for STEM achievement and attainment. The connection between the digital and physical worlds provided by embodied interaction has been shown to enhance performance and engagement in educational contexts. Spatial reasoning is a domain that lends itself naturally to embodied, physical interaction; however, there is little understanding of how embodied interaction could be incorporated into educational technology designed to train spatial reasoning skills. We propose several guidelines for gestural interaction design in spatial reasoning education games based on an empirical study with students at a local afterschool program using a custom-built computer game for training spatial skills. We present a series of gesture sets derived from an iterative design approach that are easy for children to acquire, show sufficient congruency to specific spatial operations, and enable robust recognition from the system. We also compared children's behaviors when playing the game with our gestural interface and a traditional mouse-based interface and found that children take more time but fewer steps to complete game levels when using gestures.
Article
The hippocampus is one of the brain's great mysteries. Historically, theories of its function included emotion, response inhibition, general memory and spatial perception/learning, with memory versus space emerging as a particular focus of more recent debates. A 1978 paper by Olton and colleagues captured this dichotomy by exploiting their newly developed radial maze task to reveal a profound deficit in the ability of hippocampally lesioned rats to execute a spatial memory task. This finding supported the emerging spatial map theory of hippocampal function, and helped pave the way for the subsequent uncovering of an entire brain system linking space and memory.
Conference Paper
Shown in many longitudinal studies, spatial ability is important to learning and career success. This paper, inspired by [2,14], presents the 2nd generation of TASC (Tangibles for Augmenting Spatial Cognition) to illustrate how (re)design lessons can be learned, how existing evaluation methods can be applied, and how new evaluations may be generated or envisioned, when a TEI (tangible and embodied interaction) system is built to study spatial ability.
Chapter
In 2002, Moyer, Bolyard and Spikell defined a virtual manipulative as an “an interactive, Web-based visual representation of a dynamic object that presents opportunities for constructing mathematical knowledge” (p. 373). The purpose of this chapter is to revisit, clarify and update the definition of a virtual manipulative. After clarifying what a virtual manipulative is and what it is not, we propose an updated definition for virtual manipulative: an interactive, technology-enabled visual representation of a dynamic mathematical object, including all of the programmable features that allow it to be manipulated, that presents opportunities for constructing mathematical knowledge. The chapter describes the characteristics of five of the most common virtual manipulative environments in use in education: single-representation, multi-representation, tutorial, gaming and simulation.
Article
concepts in the brain Grid cells are thought to provide the neuronal code that underlies spatial knowledge in the brain. Grid cells have mostly been studied in the context of path integration. However, recent theoretical studies have suggested that they may have a broader role in the organization of general knowledge. Constantinescu et al. investigated whether the neural representation of concepts follows a structure similar to the representation of space in the entorhinal cortex. Several brain regions, including the entorhinal cortex and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, showed gridlike neural representation of conceptual space. Science , this issue p. 1464
Conference Paper
This paper explores the question as to whether there is a relationship between a student's spatial abilities and her achievement in learning to program. After noting that there does seem to be a correlation, the paper explores the impact of trying to improve a student's spatial abilities. The paper reports on a preliminary study involving high school students. The study results suggest a correlation exists between receiving training in spatial skills and improved student performance in introductory computing. While the sample size in the study is small, this improvement appears to occur for students of different races/ethnicities and across different socio-economic statuses.
Article
Michigan Technological University has been offering a course in developing spatial skills since 1993 for students who score 60% or lower on the Purdue Spatial Visualization Test: Rotations (PSVT:R) given during freshmen orientation. For the first offering of the course, students were randomly assigned to the spatial skills course. For the next 15 years of its existence, the course was recommended to those "failing" the PSVT:R and enrollment into the course was strictly voluntary. Retention rates and grades in graphics and calculus courses were compared for those students who took the spatial training and those that did not, even though they "failed" the PSVT:R. Studies found the students taking the spatial training had significantly higher grades and retention rates. Beginning in the fall of 2009, the spatial skills course was required of all engineering students who scored 60% or lower on the PSVT:R. During an analysis to determine if requiring the training resulted in less significant positive impacts on grades, it was discovered the students taking the training had higher math and graphics grades than students who marginally passed the PSVT:R and thus did not receive the spatial training. This paper will describe a longitudinal study comparing the success of students with poorly developed and marginally developed spatial skills. Variables to be examined include: grades in graphics, mathematics, and science courses and retention rates.
Article
This study assessed the impact of computer animations illustrating the chemical reactions that occur inside a battery on students enrolled in a college introductory chemistry course. Students received two lectures on electrochemistry dealing with the chemical principles of how batteries generate electricity utilizing either animations or still diagrams. Students also completed a chemical knowledge test, a Flashlight pre-test and two chemistry content exams before receiving the lectures. A spatial ability test was given after the lectures and the students were classified as high or low spatial ability according to their spatial ability scores. The chemical knowledge and Flashlight pre-test and two previous content exams were used as covariates; the spatial ability test was used to assess any interaction of spatial ability and treatment. The dependent measures were two parts (knowledge and transfer) of a post-test on electrochemical concepts (labelled Post1 and Post2). On Post1, instructor-guided animations led to better performance than static diagrams. No interaction of spatial ability and treatment was observed. On Post2, there was no main effect of treatment, but there was a significant treatment by spatial ability interaction. Animations led to better performance overall, but more so for students with high spatial ability. These results imply that instructor-guided animations may help students acquire a better understanding of targeted chemistry concepts, and that the relationship between narration, spatial ability and computer animations illustrating chemical concepts and principles should be further investigated in future research.
Conference Paper
Tangible user interfaces (TUIs) have been the focus of much attention in the HCI and learning communities because of their many potential benefits for learning. However, there have recently been debates about whether TUIs can actually increase learning outcomes and if so, under which conditions. In this article, we investigate the effect of object representation (physical vs. virtual) on learning in the domain of spatial skills. We ran a comparative study with 46 participants to measure the effects of the object representation on the ability to establish a link between 2D and 3D representations of an object. The participants were split into two conditions: in the first one, the 3D representation of the object was virtual; in the second one, it was tangible. Findings show that in both conditions the TUI led to a significant improvement of the spatial skills. The learning outcomes were not different between the two conditions, but the performance during the activities was significantly higher when using the tangible representation as opposed to the virtual one, and even more so in for difficult cases.
Thesis
ABSTRACT: Working under classical test theory (CTT) and item response theory (IRT) frameworks, this study investigated psychometric properties of the Revised Purdue Spatial Visualization Tests: Visualization of Rotations (Revised PSVT:R). The original version, the PSVT:R was designed by Guay (1976) to measure spatial visualization ability in three-dimensional mental rotation. Since then, the instrument has predominantly been used in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education research investigating the association between the spatial ability and STEM performance of students. However, figural errors of the instrument led to its revision for this study; thus the psychometric properties of the revised version were evaluated using the data from 1022 undergraduate students across all majors at Purdue University. Within the framework of CTT, reliability evidence using Cronbach’s alpha showed item consistency in the measure, and construct validity evidence from a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) supported the unidimensional factor structure of the construct measured by the Revised PSVT:R. Four IRT models (Rasch, 1PL, 2PL, and 3PL models) evaluated in this study, and among them, the 3PL IRT model yielded the best model-data fit. Overall, results in both testing theory frameworks indicated that item difficulty and item discrimination were within an acceptable range. However, the items arranged by the complexity in rotation were not ordered by item difficulty, suggesting the existence of other factors, such as complexity in the 3-D shapes influencing respondents’ perceived difficulty level. According to the 3PL IRT model, a certain level of guessing effect exists across all the 30 items of the Revised PSVT:R. A multiple-groups CFA (MCFA) resulted in an invariant factor structure of the items of the instrument across genders, implying no test bias against gender.
Article
The term working memory refers to a brain system that provides temporary storage and manipulation of the information necessary for such complex cognitive tasks as language comprehension, learning, and reasoning. This definition has evolved from the concept of a unitary short-term memory system. Working memory has been found to require the simultaneous storage and processing of information. It can be divided into the following three subcomponents: (i) the central executive, which is assumed to be an attentional-controlling system, is important in skills such as chess playing and is particularly susceptible to the effects of Alzheimer's disease; and two slave systems, namely (ii) the visuospatial sketch pad, which manipulates visual images and (iii) the phonological loop, which stores and rehearses speech-based information and is necessary for the acquisition of both native and second-language vocabulary.
Article
Sixty participants were administered spatial ability tests, a verbal ability test, and a visualizer-verbalizer cognitive style questionnaire. Although verbalizers tended to be a homogeneous group with an intermediate level of spatial ability, there were 2 groups of visualizers, 1 with high spatial ability (the spatial type) and another with low spatial ability (the iconic type). To compare the use of mental images by the 2 types of visualizers in solving problems, interviews with 8 high-spatial visualizers and 9 low-spatial visualizers were conducted. The students were presented with graphs of motion and were asked to visualize and interpret the motion of an object. Whereas low-spatial visualizers interpreted the graphs as pictures and mostly relied on visual (iconic) imagery, high-spatial visualizers constructed more schematic images and manipulated them spatially. In addition, we compared problem-solving strategies used by verbalizers to those of visualizers. In contrast to visualizers, verbalizers of low and high spatial ability did not have any clearly marked preference to use visual or spatial imagery.
Article
The above article (DOI: 10.1002/acp.1420 ) was published online on 26 November 2007 and in print in Volume 22: 996‐1013, 2008. A printing error was subsequently identified in the article. Page 996: Missing author information. Should read Dr. Nora S. Newcombe, Temple University, Philadelphia, USA, National Science Foundation Grants REC‐0337360 and SBE0541957.
Article
This study investigated (a) mathematics achievement (Test of Academic Progress) of 589 female and 644 male, predominantly white, 9th-12th grade students enrolled in mathematics courses from four schools, controlling for mathematics background and general ability (Quick Word Test); (b) relationships to mathematics achievement, and to sex-related differences in mathematics achievement, of spatial visualization (Differential Aptitude Test), eight attitudes measured by the Fennema-Sherman Mathematics Attitudes Scales, a measure of Mathematics Activities outside of school, and number of Mathematics Related Courses and Space Related Courses taken. Complex results were obtained. Few sex-related cognitive differences but many attitudinal differences were found. Analyses of variance, covariance, correlation, and principal components analysis techniques were used. The results showed important relationships between socio-cultural factors and sex-related cognitive differences.
Article
The ability to visualize in three dimensions is a cognitive skill that has been shown to be important for success in engineering and other technological fields. For engineering, the ability to mentally rotate 3‐D objects is especially important. Unfortunately, of all the cognitive skills, 3‐D rotation abilities exhibit robust gender differences, favoring males. The assessment of 3‐D spatial skills and associated gender differences has been a topic of educational research for nearly a century; however, a great deal of the previous work has been aimed at merely identifying differences. The author has been conducting applied research in the area of spatial skills development for more than a decade aimed at identifying practical methods for improving 3‐D spatial skills, especially for women engineering students. This paper details the significant findings obtained over the past several years through this research and identifies strategies that appear to be effective in developing 3‐D spatial skills and in contributing to student success.
Article
This article presents 3 studies that examine how students and experts employ mental rotation and a learned heuristic to solve chemistry tasks that involve spatial information. Results from Study 1 indicate that despite instruction in analytical strategies, students choose to employ mental rotation on canonical assessment tasks. In Study 2, experts were observed to selectively employ analytical strategies for the same tasks. In Study 3, students who used mental rotation were trained to use analytical strategies with equal success. Collectively, the 3 studies address the affordances of alternative strategies in science and the potential role of each in the classroom.