Individuals often claim that they vividly remember information with negative emotional content. At least two types of information could lead to this sense of enhanced vividness: Information about the emotional item itself (e.g., the exact visual details of a snake) and information about the context in which the emotional item was encountered…

Today's designers deal with a range of communication modes. These modes vary from hand gestures to sketches, physical models, and computer-generated images. It has been the norm to use these mediums throughout the process to visualize the intended design so that the potential users, designers, team members, and clients can understand the end…

This study compares the tendency for numerals to elicit spontaneous perceptions of colour or taste (synaesthesia) with the tendency to visualise numbers as occupying particular visuo-spatial configurations (number forms). The prevalence of number forms was found to be significantly higher in synaesthetes experiencing colour compared both to…

The authors conducted 2 experiments to study the metrics of spatial distance in a mental imagery task. In both experiments, participants first memorized the layout of a building containing 10 rooms with 24 objects. Participants then received mental imagery instructions and imagined how they walked through the building from one room to another. The…

The beginning of January--a fresh start. This presents a brand new opportunity to help students plan a bright future. This article provides a step-by-step guide to ensure a student's dreams come true. Each new year gives students another chance to get it right. The author provides the following 12 steps to ensure students' success in achieving…

This article takes a brief walk through two complex cultures, looking at similarities and differences between them. Visual perception is vital to both art and science, for to see is to understand. The article compares how education in each subject fosters visualization and creative thinking.

As algorithms have been seen to be hard to teach and learn, teachers have tried to look for help in algorithm animation. While the effect of algorithm animation on learning has been studied, but not reliably evidenced, this study tries to approach the problem from a different perspective. Sixty hours of assignment sessions in an introductory…

This article describes how spatial instruction with preservice teachers can be implemented in a middle-grades mathematics methods class. A "Reflect and Discuss" section is included for professional development study. (Contains 4 figures.)

As well as being important for school mathematics, spatial thinking is a big component of advanced mathematical studies too. As Jones (2001:55) points out, "Much of the thinking that is required in higher mathematics is spatial in nature. Einstein's comments on thinking in images are well known. Numerous mathematicians report using spatial…

Explicit instruction in thinking skills must be a priority goal of all teachers. In this book, the author presents a framework of the five Rs: Relevancy, Richness, Relatedness, Rigor, and Recursiveness. The framework serves to illuminate instruction in critical and creative thinking skills for K-12 teachers across content areas. Each chapter…

Value-by-area maps, or cartograms, provide a curiosity-provoking method of depicting geographically related data. The use of cartograms for learning such data involves a learner's familiarity with the region depicted and the distortion of true, earth-centered scale. To examine the effects of region familiarity and region distortion on learning…

The effectiveness of mental imagery instructions and picture presentation was evaluated in first and fourth grade children and in adults. Results indicated that the visual mnemonics reliably facilitated cued recall and recognition (but not free recall) in children but facilitated only free recall in adults. (Author/GO)

This study attempted to verify an earlier finding that visual imagery does not desynchronize alpha rhythms, to determine if the revisualization of a nocturnal dream is desynchronizing beyond the expectation to request revisualization of a dream, and to demonstrate that hot images are produced by the repressed aims of drives. (Author/RK)

Describes the construction of unit cells using clear plastic cubes which can be disassembled, and one inch cork balls of various colors, which can be cut in halves, quarters, or eighths, and glued on the inside face of the cube, thus simulating a unit cell. (MLH)