A study of two measures of spatial ability as predictors of success in different levels of general chemistry

Abstract

Preliminary data (Bodner and McMillen, 1986) suggested a correlation between spatial ability and performance in a general chemistry course for science and engineering majors.This correlation was seen not only on highly spatial tasks such as predicting the structures of ionic solids (r = 0.29), but also on tasks such as multiple-choice stoichiometry questions (r = 0.32) that might not be expected to involve spatial skills. To further investigate the relationship between spatial ability and performance in introductory chemistry courses, two spatial tests were given to 1648 students in a course for science and engineering majors (Carter, 1984) and 850 students in a course for stubents from nursing and agriculture (La-Russa, 1985) at Purdue. Scores on the spatial tests consistently contributed a small but significant amount to success on measures of performance in chemistry. Correlations were largest, however, for subscores that grouped questions that tested problem solving skills rather than rote memory or the application of simple algorithms, and correlations were also large for verbally complex questions thaty required the students to disembed and restructure relevant information. 0

Exploring visuospatial thinking in chemistry learning

“…Students with lower visuospatial abilities 1. are unable to perform as well as their peers with higher visuospatial abilities on solving both spatial and nonspatial chemistry problems (Bodner & McMillen, 1986;Carter, LaRussa, & Bodner, 1987); 2. have difficulties reorganizing or transforming the information provided by questions into a visual representation, such as drawing preliminary figures (Pribyl & Bodner, 1987). This suggests that as using visual representations is common practice in chemistry and conceptual knowledge of chemistry is embedded in various types of molecular and symbolic representations, low spatial ability students are disadvantaged.…”

“…They found that students with high spatial ability appeared to have higher scores on problems that required problem-solving skills rather than rote memory or the simple algorithms such as crystal structure and stoichiometry. Correlations were stronger for verbally complex questions that required multiple steps of calculations and restructuring relevant information of the problem (Carter, LaRussa, & Bodner, 1987). Similarly, Staver and Jacks (1988) showed that students' visuospatial abilities significantly influenced their performance on balancing chemical equations.…”

“…An example of such a test is the Purdue Visualization of Rotation test (see example in Figure 3), a commonly used measurement of spatial visualization in chemistry education (Bodner & McMillen, 1986;Carter, LaRussa, & Bodner, 1987;Yang, Greenbowe, & Andre, 1999). In this test, participants view two rotated versions of one 3D figure, infer the type of transformation between them, and make the same transformation with a new 3D figure (Figure 3).…”

“…Closure flexibility is measured by tasks such as the Find-a-Shape-Puzzle in which people must find simple figures embedded in more complex ones (see example in Figure 5). This factor is also considered related to chemistry problem solving (Bodner & McMillen, 1986;Carter, LaRussa, & Bodner, 1987). The synthesis scheme shown in Figure 1 is an example.…”

“…To further investigate the relationship between spatial abilities and students' performances on problem solving, Bodner and his colleagues (Carter, LaRussa, & Bodner, 1987) designed a study to examine whether spatial abilities influenced students' abilities to solve various types of chemistry problems differently. They found that students with high spatial ability appeared to have higher scores on problems that required problem-solving skills rather than rote memory or the simple algorithms such as crystal structure and stoichiometry.…”