Search results for "Mental rotation"

2014

Background: Motor imagery is a potential tool to investigate action representation, as it can provide insights into the processes of action planning and preparation. Recent studies suggest that depressed patients present specific impairment in mental rotation. The present study was designed to investigate the influence of unipolar depression on motor imagery ability.Methods: Fourteen right-handed patients meeting DSM-IV criteria for unipolar depression were compared to fourteen matched healthy controls. Imagery ability was accessed by the timing correspondence between executed and imagined movements during a pointing task, involving strong spatiotemporal constraints (speed/accuracy trade of…

Aging Affects the Mental Rotation of Left and Right Hands

2009

BACKGROUND:Normal aging significantly influences motor and cognitive performance. Little is known about age-related changes in action simulation. Here, we investigated the influence of aging on implicit motor imagery. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS:Twenty young (mean age: 23.9+/-2.8 years) and nineteen elderly (mean age: 78.3+/-4.5 years) subjects, all right-handed, were required to determine the laterality of hands presented in various positions. To do so, they mentally rotated their hands to match them with the hand-stimuli. We showed that: (1) elderly subjects were affected in their ability to implicitly simulate movements of the upper limbs, especially those requiring the largest amplit…

The influence of others’ actions on perspective taking: Poster

2021

For the mind's eye the world is two-dimensional.

2010

The nature of visual mental images is a topic that has puzzled neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers alike. On the one hand, mental images might preserve the 3-D properties of our perceptual world. On the other hand, they might be akin to 2-D pictures, such as photographs, paintings, or drawings. In the present study, 16 observers judged where real objects (Experiment 1) or photographs thereof (Experiment 2) were pointing. Both experiments contained a perception condition and an imagery condition. In Experiment 1, there was a significant difference between the pointing errors in the perception and the imagery conditions, whereas there was no such difference in Experiment 2. In im…

Positive Effects of Videogame Use on Visuospatial Competencies: The Impact of Visualization Style in Preadolescents and Adolescents

2019

Use of videogames (VGs) is almost ubiquitous in preadolescents' and adolescents' everyday life. One of the most intriguing research topics about positive effects of VG use is about the domain of visuospatial competencies. Previous research show that training with videogames enables children and adolescents to improve their scores in visuospatial tests (such as mental rotation of shapes and cubes), and that such training could overcome gender differences in these domains. Our study aimed at (1) verifying the positive effects of videogame use in the visuospatial domain both for male and female adolescents and preadolescents and (2) verifying whether the visualization style (2D or isometric 3D…

Orientation Aids for Mobile Maps

2015

Using mobile maps to represent urban, work, or entertainment environments offers new possibilities to plan and carry out tasks. One potentially critical problem in mobile map usage is the misalignment between the user's frame of reference and the frame of reference of the map. In the experiment reported here, three different ‘orientation aids’ were tested in the context of restricted space, such as a large factory hall. The aim of the study was to find out how user interface design can help the user mentally align misaligned frames of reference for efficient mobile map use. The results of the experiment (N = 12) suggest using a ‘you are here’ marker and landmark highlighting, while canonica…

Continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) on left cerebellar hemisphere affects mental rotation tasks during music listening.

2013

Converging evidence suggests an association between spatial and music domains. A cerebellar role in music-related information processing as well as in spatial-temporal tasks has been documented. Here, we investigated the cerebellar role in the association between spatial and musical domains, by testing performances in embodied (EMR) or abstract (AMR) mental rotation tasks of subjects listening Mozart Sonata K.448, which is reported to improve spatial-temporal reasoning, in the presence or in the absence of continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) of the left cerebellar hemisphere. In the absence of cerebellar cTBS, music listening did not influence either MR task, thus not revealing a “Moz…

Alternative Strategies in Processing 3D Objects Diagrams: Static, Animated and Interactive Presentation of a Mental Rotation Test in an Eye Movements…

2014

Spatial abilities involved in reasoning with diagrams have been assessed using tests supposed to require mental rotation (cube figures of the Vandenberg & Kruse). However, Hegarty (2010) described alternative strategies: Mental rotation is not always used; analytical strategies can be used instead. In this study, we compared three groups of participants in three external formats of presentation of the referent figure in the Vandenberg & Kruse test: static, animated, interactive. During the test, participants were eye tracked. After the test, they were interrogated on their strategies for each item during the viewing of the replay of their own eye movement in a cued retrospective verbal prot…

Enhanced Spatial Navigation Skills in Sequence-Space Synesthetes

2018

Contains fulltext : 219554.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) Individuals with sequence-space synesthesia (SSS) perceive sequences like months, days and numbers in certain spatial arrangements. Several cognitive benefits have been associated with SSS, such as enhanced mental rotation, more vivid visual imagery and an advantage in spatial processing. The current study aimed to further investigate these cognitive benefits, focusing on spatial navigation skills, to explore if their enhanced sensitivity to spatial relations is reflected in enhanced navigational performance. Synesthetes were distinguished from controls by means of a questionnaire, a consistency test and drawings. A virtu…

Recognising a hand by grasp.

2000

The present study aimed to demonstrate that motor representations are used to recognise biological stimuli. In three experiments subjects were required to judge laterality of hands and forearms presented by pictures. The postures of the hands were those assumed when holding a small, medium and large sphere. In experiment 1, the sphere held in hand was presented, whereas in experiment 2 it was absent. In experiment 3, the same images, showing holding-a-sphere hands, as in experiment 1 were presented, but without forearm. In all experiments one finger of each hand could be absent. In experiment 1 recognition time was longer for those hand postures for which the corresponding grasping motor ac…