This paper describes a comparative experiment with five wellknown tree visualization systems, and Windows Explorer as a baseline system. Subjects performed tasks relating to the structure of a directory hierarchy, and to attributes of files and directories. Task completion times, correctness and user satisfaction were measured, and video recordings of subjects ’ interaction with the systems were made. Significant system and task type effects and an interaction between system and task type were found. Qualitative analyses of the video recordings were thereupon conducted to determine reasons for the observed differences, resulting in several findings and design recommendations as well as implications for future experiments with tree visualization systems.

for assistance, and Nora Newcombe and Elliott Blass for advice and comments on the manuscript. Above all, I am grateful to Ariel Grace and Kristin Shutts for their unending support and after-hours labor on this project. Draft, 4/20/05. This paper has not yet been peer reviewed. Please do not copy or cite without author's permission. This report considers three prominent claims that boys and men have greater natural aptitude for high-level careers in mathematics and science. According to the first claim, males are more focused on objects and mechanical systems from the beginning of life. According to the second claim, males have a profile of spatial and numerical abilities that predisposes them to greater aptitude in mathematics. According to the third claim, males show greater variability in mathematical aptitude, yielding a preponderance of males at the upper end of the distribution of mathematical talent. Research on cognitive development in human infants and preschool children, and research on cognitive performance by students at all levels, provides evidence against these claims. Mathematical and scientific reasoning develop from a set of biologically based capacities that males and females share. From these capacities, men and women appear to develop equal talent for mathematics and science.

This chapter describes the successful linkage of basic research on visual imagery and spatial thinking to the activities of soldiers tasked to neutralize highly feared (Hackworth & England, 2002) and common weapons of both war and terrorism. More specifically, the chapter’s purpose is to describe contributions of fundamental science on visuo-spatial cognition to two applied projects whose impact illustrates the practical value of cognitive science. Both projects employed cognitive engineering to create training programs for operators of equipment that the U.S. military uses to detect landmines. The projects shared a common approach to training development: Equipment-specific models of expert operators ’ skills provided content for designing the training programs. The analyses supporting model construction suggested that significant components of the experts ’ skills involved spatial information processing. Visual information-processing studies, particularly research on visual imagery and mental synthesis, guided the analyses and the translation of findings into strategies for training. Translating the expert models ’ contents into training activities required more than just an 231 Chapter-09.qxd 6/26/2006 7:41 PM Page 232 232 STASZEWSKI understanding of the mechanisms that produced the expert operators’ performance. Here, studies of categorization of spatial displays and individual differences in spatial ability guided not only the design of training activities, but also the development and use of training aids. Both projects achieved their objectives and, more importantly, have improved U.S. soldiers ’ mine detection capability. Field test results for the training program developed for standard detection equipment used by the U.S. Army in countermine operations—the AN/PSS-12 (PSS-12, shown in

SUMMARY—Amid ongoing public speculation about the reasons for sex differences in careers in science and mathematics, we present a consensus statement that is based on the best available scientific evidence. Sex differences in science and math achievement and ability are smaller for the mid-range of the abilities distribution than they are for those with the highest levels of achievement and ability. Males are more variable on most measures of quantitative and visuospatial ability, which necessarily results in more males at both high- and low-ability extremes; the reasons why males are often more variable remain elusive. Successful careers in math and science require many types of cognitive abilities. Females tend to excel in verbal abilities, with large differences between females and males found when assessments include writing

Gifted students with spatial strengths are often overlooked and underserved in American schools. These students have areas of remarkable talent but often have verbal learning difficulties that prevent them from being identified for gifted services as traditional assessments emphasize verbal and quantitative skills, not nonverbal expertise. The dwindling number of American students pursuing higher level degrees in mathematics and science, natural strength areas for students with spatial skills, emphasizes the reasons educators need to identify and encourage these students at an early age. This exploratory correlational research investigated the practicality and effectiveness of identification tools intended to locate elementary children with spatial strengths. My Thinking Style (MTS), a self-report survey instrument, was developed for this research. The results of the survey, determined through one-on-one interviews with fourth grade students, were compared to performance on the Naglieri Nonverbal Ability Test (NNAT) and the block design subtest of the

In this article, both economics and psychology were used to derive predictors of university students ’ discipline choice. From economics the idea of utility maximization was used. Using psychological theory non-monetary profits of education were made explicit. Freshmen of nine different university disciplines (law, history, economics, psychology, political sciences, English linguistics, Spanish linguistics, medical biology, and dentistry) evaluated thirteen benefits, that were associated with their study. These subjective utilities were grouped into four types of utilities: prospects of a good career, acquiring general knowledge, the effort a study requires, and the possibility to interact with other people. Large differences were found between disciplines on the utility scores. The utilities and gender were used in a multinomial logit model to predict discipline choice. The model correctly predicted discipline choice for 61 % of the student sample. Further analysis showed that the exclusion of gender did not decrease model fit substantially.

In this article, both economics and psychology were used to derive predictors of university students ’ discipline choice. From economics the idea of utility maximization was used. Using psychological theory non-monetary profits of education were made explicit. Freshmen of nine different university disciplines (law, history, economics, psychology, political sciences, English linguistics, Spanish linguistics, medical biology, and dentistry) evaluated thirteen benefits, that were associated with their study. These subjective utilities were grouped into four types of utilities: prospects of a good career, acquiring general knowledge, the effort a study requires, and the possibility to interact with other people. Large differences were found between disciplines on the utility scores. The utilities and gender were used in a multinomial logit model to predict discipline choice. The model correctly predicted discipline choice for 61 % of the student sample. Further analysis showed that the exclusion of gender did not decrease model fit substantially.

Spatial problem-solving tasks are often used to evaluate people’s cognitive abilities. For example, Raven’s Progressive Matrices is a popular intelligence test. In it, an individual is shown an array of twodimensional images, with one image missing. The individual must compare the images and identify a pattern of differences between them, in order to solve for the missing image. Performance on tasks such as Raven’s and geometric analogy (“A is to B as C is to..?”) correlates strongly with performance on many other ability tasks, in the spatial, verbal, and mathematical domains. Thus, these tasks appear to depend on core, general-purpose representations and processes. However, it is as yet unclear what those representations and processes are. To better understand these tasks, we developed Spatial Routines for Sketches (SRS), a general framework for modeling spatial problem-solving. SRS is based on a set of psychological claims about how people perform spatial problem-solving: 1) When possible, people use qualitative representations describing features such as relative position or orientation, rather than exact numerical values. 2) Spatial representations are hierarchical. A given image might be represented as object groups, individual objects, or the parts within each object. 3) Qualitative spatial representations can be compared via structuremapping. Structure-mapping involves aligning the relational structure in two representations to find the