| The goal of this paper was to investigate whether spatial experience could help close the performance gap in mental rotation ability observed between males and females. Three longitudinal studies investigated the effect of practice and training on mental rotation ability. Structural equation modeling was utilized in order to delineate the trajectory of growth. A curvilinear model was found to fit the data best, most likely due to reaching ceiling effects on the MRT. Males outperformed females, and individuals with high spatial experience prior to the study outperformed those with low spatial experience. Individuals with initially lower levels of spatial experience, however, improved more rapidly than individuals with higher levels of spatial experience. In addition, individuals given training showed greater rates of growth than individuals only repeating the MRT. Practice and training effects on the MRT were retained and there was some evidence of transfer to other visualization tasks. Strategy choice during mental rotation problem solving was related to gender, spatial experience, and training, as well as to MRT performance. Results support the hypothesis that practice and training effects on the MRT are substantial, although training administered in these studies was not sufficient to eradicate, or even reduce, the gender difference in mental rotation performance. Suggestions for future research are discussed. |
