Spatial abilities and the effects of computer animation on short term comprehension and long term conceptual understanding

The purpose of this study was to determine if the use of computer animation increased understanding of a concept involving time and motion, in this case the concept of diffusion, especially for low spatial ability subjects. The rationale was that animation could strengthen the meaning-based propositional memory representations and this rested on these four assumptions; (1) spatial representations are the more appropriate form of memory representations for the concepts involving time and motion, (2) spatial abilities vary with individuals, (3) apparent motion is the basis for the perception of animation, and (4) animation communicates ideas involving time and motion better than verbal presentations. The study tested 116 sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students on a topic of diffusion. The students were presented with one of three types of presentations on diffusion. One was textual material only, a second was the same textual material with static pictures, and the third used the text with computer animations. The subjects were tested on short term comprehension immediately following the program and on long term comprehension approximately one week later. None of the predictions were supported. The type of presentation had no statistically significant effect on the final performance of subjects on either of the two tests on short term and long term comprehension used in the present study. Contrary to the prediction, subjects who scored low on spatial ability and who received animation did not perform significantly better than those low spatial ability subjects who did not receive animation. While the means for the low spatial ability subjects were ordered as expected in that the highest means were found in the animation group, the difference did not reach statistical significance. There appeared to be three factors that contributed to the results. One factor involved the method of measurement for the short and long term memory representations. Both measures were essentially measuring verbal instead of spatial memory. A second factor was the fact the many of the students had some prior exposure to the topic of diffusion. The third factor that may have contributed to the results was that many subjects may not have used the spatial abilities they possessed.