# data[].attributes.headline
"The relation between children's constructive play activities, spatial abilities, and mathematical word problem-solving performance

# data[].attributes.subject
"The relation between children's constructive play activities, spatial abilities, and mathematical word problem-solving performance

# data[].attributes.headline
Spatial awareness is a function of the temporal not the posterior parietal lobe.

# data[].attributes.subject
Spatial awareness is a function of the temporal not the posterior parietal lobe.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Spatial awareness is a function of the temporal not the posterior parietal lobe. - PubMed - NCBI

# data[].attributes.headline
Neural Correlates of Object vs. Spatial Visualization Abilities

# data[].attributes.subject
Neural Correlates of Object vs. Spatial Visualization Abilities

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Neuroscience research demonstrates that the visual areas of the brain are divided into two distinct pathways. The dorsal, or spatial, and ventral, or object pathways. The object pathway runs from occipital lobe to inferior temporal lobe, processing visual appearances of objects in terms of color, detail, shape, and size. The spatial pathway runs from occipital lobe to posterior parietal lobe, processing spatial attributes such as location, movement, spatial transformations and spatial relations.

We are using fRMI to explore the neural mechanisms underlying individual differences in object vs. spatial visualization ability

. Our results (Motes, Malach, & Kozhevnikov , 2008) suggest that visual-spatial ability is related to distinct patterns of neural activity during the processing of visual-spatial information. When given an object imagery task, both spatial and object visualizers showed bilateral task-related activity in object processing areas, but spatial visualizers showed greater bilateral activity in object processing areas than did object visualizers. In addition, spatial visualizers also showed greater activation in attentional areas than the object visualizers. The data indicate that high object-processing ability is associated with more efficient use of visual-object resources, resulting in less neural activity in the object-processing pathway.

Currently, we are examining the neural underpinnings of visual-spatial and visual-object processing in members of different professions.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Neural Correlates of Object vs. Spatial Visualization Abilities

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Neuroscience research demonstrates that the visual areas of the brain are divided into two distinct pathways. The dorsal, or spatial, and ventral, or object pathways. The object pathway runs from occipital lobe to inferior temporal lobe, processing visual appearances of objects in terms of color, detail, shape, and size.

# data[].attributes.headline
Why ‘Spatial ability’ could be the key to Stem success

# data[].attributes.subject
Why ‘Spatial ability’ could be the key to Stem success

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Spatial thinking is the type of skill that many of us take for granted. Yet, spatial abilities are what allow us to navigate our way around the world, to understand the relationships between objects and to make sense of their dimensions.

"We use spatial thinking all the time," says Emily Farran, professor in developmental psychology at the University of Surrey. "It's very core to everything we do. We live in a very spatial world."

Speaking this week on the Tes Podagogy podcast, Farran gives an everyday example of the type of task that requires spatial thinking:

"If you want to present someone's birthday cake to them so that they can read the writing [on it], then you need to think ahead as to which perspective you need the cake to be presented to them in. So you're visualising how you might rotate that birthday cake," she says.

Spatial thinking is what also allows us to move around a room without bumping into objects, or to complete basic tasks like getting dressed.

However, Farran's research focuses on a different use for these skills: the link between spatial abilities and success in Stem subjects - something that she feels teachers need to become more aware of.

Spatial ability and Stem

Studies have shown that children who have higher spatial abilities are more likely to do better in subjects such as science and maths at school, she explains, and are also more likely to enter careers in Stem.

"Spatial ability is needed to understand models; to read diagrams; if people need to rearrange formulae in maths or in science, and to interpret things that are given at different scales - for example, cells are usually scaled up and the solar system is usually scaled down - and then in maths obviously there's a lot of shape and symmetry, which is all spatial. Numerical relationships all require spatial skills," Farran says.

Because so many aspects of the maths and science curriculum depend on spatial skills, children who are not naturally predisposed to these abilities are more likely to struggle with these subjects, she explains.

However, there are things that teachers can do to enhance these skills and to make children aware of their existing spatial abilities.

"Spatial ability is malleable, so training in spatial ability is pretty effective," Farran says.

She believes that if teachers understand where spatial ability is important, then that's a good starting point.

Another positive action is for teachers to integrate spatial thinking into their teaching through increasing their use of spatial language: for example, deliberately using opposite terms like 'left' and 'right' and words like 'between', 'slope' and 'parallel'.

Farran adds that the important thing is for teachers to begin encouraging spatial abilities more consciously and for them to be more explicit with children about the importance of these skills.

"Children need to be able to spatialise their thinking and teachers needs to spatialise their teaching," she says.

You can listen for free by downloading the podcast from iTunes or listening below.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Why 'Spatial ability' could be the key to Stem success

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Spatial thinking is the type of skill that many of us take for granted. Yet, spatial abilities are what allow us to navigate our way around the world, to understand the relationships between objects and to make sense of their dimensions.

# data[].attributes.headline
Deconstructing Brain Systems Involved in Memory and Spatial Skills

# data[].attributes.subject
Deconstructing Brain Systems Involved in Memory and Spatial Skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In work that reconciles two competing views of brain structures involved in memory and spatial perception, researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have conducted experiments that suggest the hippocampus - a small region in the brain's limbic system - is dedicated largely to memory formation and not to spatial skills, such as navigation. The study is published in this week's issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"The role of the hippocampus in spatial cognition versus memory formation is a major debating point in our understanding of how the human brain processes its exterior environment," said senior author Larry Squire, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry, Neurosciences, and Psychology. "This study shows that the hippocampus is primarily associated with memory. It's an adjudication on two perspectives that span more than 60 years of research."

In one of these perspectives, developed in the 1950s, the hippocampus is viewed as being the critical structure enabling the formation of declarative, long-term memories, such as the ability to remember one's high-school prom. That view shifted in the 1970s when experiments conducted largely with rats showed that the hippocampus plays a major role in spatial skills, such as those needed to navigate through a maze. The experiments led some researchers to speculate that the human hippocampus might also be active in spatial cognition and mapmaking skills.

"We have not found evidence that this is the case," said Squire, who is also a research career scientist at the Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System. "Patients with hippocampal lesions can perform spatial tasks as long as these tasks don't depend on long-term memory. We think they can do these spatial tasks because these tasks can be managed within short-term memory functions, supported by the frontal lobe of the neocortex. The discrepancy we see with rats may reflect the fact that rodents don't have a well-developed frontal cortex or the associated short-term memory processing skills. The spatial tasks that we can do with our neocortex using short-term memory must be performed by the hippocampus in rats."

The results are based on experiments with six adults with hippocampal lesions, one adult with damage to the medial temporal lobe, which includes the hippocampus, and 12 control subjects. For the experiments, participants were asked to study a simple scene, such as a pair of boots, and to draw the scene from memory. The drawings were scored for detail and accuracy on a 1-5 scale. Participants were also evaluated for a normal tendency, known as boundary extension, in which people tend to recall an image as having a larger background and smaller foreground than is present in reality. In the boot example, this means people tend to draw the boots smaller than they were in the original photograph. The background consequently takes up a larger fraction of the image, hence the term boundary extension.

In a second set of experiments, participants were asked to look at a scene, such as a slide in a park, and describe what might come into view if the image were enlarged. The participants' narratives were scored for details, spatial references, thoughts and emotions.

All participants with hippocampal damage demonstrated an impaired ability to accurately recall details about the boots. Their average score was 2, compared with 3 for the control group. However, the patients displayed normal boundary extension. Both patients and control subjects shrunk the size of the boots relative to the background by about 60 percent. Both groups were also equally skilled in imagining and constructing detailed narratives about what might come into view if the scenes were expanded.

"The value of this type of research is that we are building an understanding of how the brain works," Squire said. "We know Alzheimer's disease usually begins in the medial temporal lobe and this study reminds us that it's not the patients' spatial skills that are immediately at risk, it is their memory. This is consistent with clinical experiences. Patients don't complain about loss of spatial skills, they complain about memory loss."

Co-authors include Soyun Kim and Adam J. O. Dede, Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System and UC San Diego; and Ramona O. Hopkins, Brigham Young University and Intermountain Medical Center, Utah.

Funding for this research came, in part, from the Department of Veterans Affairs, National Science Foundation (1120395) and National Institute of Mental Health (24600).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Deconstructing Brain Systems Involved in Memory and Spatial Skills

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In work that reconciles two competing views of brain structures involved in memory and spatial perception, researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have conducted experiments that suggest the hippocampus - a small region in the brain's limbic system - is dedicated largely to memory formation and not to spatial skills, such as navigation.

# data[].attributes.headline
Spatial skills higher among those who played with construction-based toys and video games in childhood: study

# data[].attributes.subject
Spatial skills higher among those who played with construction-based toys and video games in childhood: study

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Childhood play experiences strongly shape a person's spatial skills, according to a new CIRES-led study-those skills can be critical to success in fields like science and engineering. Young adults who played with construction-based toys such as Legos, or with certain types of video games outperformed other peers in tests of spatial reasoning-like the skill needed to mentally rotate objects. And most notably, the new research found that gender differences in spatial skills disappear when the researchers considered the impact of childhood play.

"The human brain is malleable and trainable," said Anne Gold, lead author and director of CIRES Education & Outreach. "By providing spatial training to K-12 children, and providing spatially demanding toys before schooling starts, we can give them the opportunity to develop skills important in fields like science, technology, engineering and math."

The team, who published their work today in Geosphere, surveyed hundreds of undergraduate students and found a huge spread in their spatial skills-students scored between 6 and 75 percent correct responses on a written, spatial-knowledge test. This poses a problem: It's difficult to teach a college-level class with so much variability in skill level. Gold and her colleagues sought to explain this contrast because most geologists need strong spatial skills to be successful.

"All of these students completed a K-12 education. If spatial skills were taught in grade school, we wouldn't see this significant spread of skills across the university classroom," said Gold. "Something must be happening earlier in childhood or outside of school that makes some kids better spatial thinkers."

She and colleagues from the University of Colorado Boulder and Carleton College in Minnesota gave written tests to 345 university undergraduates enrolled in geology courses at CU Boulder. Students tackled multiple-choice questions that required them to mentally rotate obscure shapes, for example, or visualize an object's cross section.

The researchers dissected the influence of several factors on spatial skills scores, including: college major, childhood play patterns, standardized test scores, number of science courses taken, and gender. They found that childhood play patterns made a huge difference:

Spatial skill scores were significantly higher among students who engaged with construction-based toys, and certain video games.

Other studies have shown the influence of childhood play on spatial skills, but Gold's team is the first to show howthe gender difference well described in the literature is mediated through childhood play.

Overall, male students performed better than female students on the test, but the young women and men who played with construction-based toys and video games performed equally well. In other words, when researchers controlled for the impact of childhood play patterns, gender differences disappeared.

The new research highlights the need for more access to spatial training and experiences for girls and women-or for anyone who desires success in a STEM career. In addition to providing spatially engaging toys to young children, Gold also suggests offering spatial trainings in grade school or even adulthood. She has preliminary evidence that people can improve their skills with spatial training, whether they lacked spatial skills in the first place or have just gotten rusty over the years.

"What you choose to do over your life can affect your spatial reasoning," said Gold. "It doesn't need to be video games or Legos specifically-but you should engage in something that's spatially demanding. It can really make a difference."

Provided by: University of Colorado at Boulder

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Spatial skills higher among those who played with construction-based toys and video games in childhood: study

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Childhood play experiences strongly shape a person's spatial skills, according to a new CIRES-led study-those skills can be critical to success in fields like science and engineering. Young adults who played with construction-based toys such as Legos, or with certain types of video games outperformed other peers in tests of spatial reasoning-like the skill needed to mentally rotate objects.