Seeing with the Mind: The Relationship Between Spatial Ability and Inferring Dynamic Behaviour from Graphs

Abstract

Research has shown that many individuals have difficulties solving tasks that involve a principal component of dynamic systems: accumulation. They incorrectly assume that the behavioural pattern of a stock resembles that of its flows and vice versa. This has become known as correlation heuristic reasoning. Much less is known about the underlying causes of this inability to correctly infer dynamic behaviour from graphs. We tested if two dimensions of spatial ability, spatial visualization and spatial relations, are related to selecting correct or correlation heuristic answers in tasks involving graphs over time. The analyses show that spatial visualization is positively related to performance in some systems thinking inventory tasks and is negatively related to responses that show correlation heuristic reasoning. We conclude by discussing avenues for future research into this phenomenon. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The dual‐process theory and understanding of stocks and flows

“…In Study 2, male participants performed significantly better than females. This is in agreement with prior studies (Veldhuis and Korzilius, ; Baghaei Lakeh and Ghaffarzadegan, ; Sterman, ) and we believe controlling for more variables eventually eliminates this effect. Moreover, having a graduate degree increased the chances of participants answering the stock questions correctly in Study 1.…”

“…This study was focused on the laboratory setting and more investigations are needed before generalizing the solution for real-world cases such as public understanding of global warming. This study is in line with a few others that have investigated various cognitive reasons that are responsible for people's poor performance on SF tasks (Veldhuis and Korzilius, 2016;Fischer and Gonzalez, 2015), but it also differs as it focuses on the dual-process modes of thinking.…”

Math matters: mathematical knowledge plays an essential role in Chinese undergraduates' stock‐and‐flow task performance

“…Previous research shows that SF failure and the correlation heuristic are robust, present under a wide range of task conditions, including information displays (Cronin and Gonzalez, ; Cronin et al ., ; Newell et al ., ), cover stories and contexts (Ossimitz, ; Cronin and Gonzalez, ; Cronin et al ., ; Qi and Gonzalez, ; Newell et al ., ), motivation (Cronin and Gonzalez, ; Cronin et al ., ), domain experience (Brunstein et al ., ; Abdel‐Hamid et al ., ; Qi and Gonzalez, ), analytic reasoning style (Baghaei Lakeh and Ghaffarzadegan, ; Weinhardt et al ., ), mathematical knowledge (Qi and Gonzalez, ), global/local processing style (Fischer and Gonzalez, ; Weinhardt et al ., ) and other conditions (Gonzalez and Wong, ; Korzilius et al ., ; Veldhuis and Korzilius, ). Although many find that more exposure to stocks and flows, such as system dynamics courses and system thinking exercises, could bring improvements in SF task performance and reduce the prevalence of the correlation heuristic (Kainz and Ossimitz, ; Pala and Vennix, ; Sterman, ), most factors involved in SF failure and the correlation heuristic have not been proved to be useful in bringing an improvement of participants' performance in SF tasks.…”

Bathtub Dynamics Revisited: An Examination of Déformation Professionelle in Higher Education

“…Whereas we vary the cover story, other studies test the impact of framing, visualization, and the format of data (e.g. Cronin and Gonzalez, ; Veldhuis and Korzilius, ; Schwarz et al, ; Sedlmeier et al, ; Fischer and Gonzalez, ; Baghaei Lakeh and Ghaffarzadegan, ; Newell et al, ).…”