Individual Differences in Graphical Reasoning

People sometimes appear to represent graphical information by analogy to space. In this paper we consider the extent to which the tendency to represent information by analogy to space calls on spatial resources. We also examine whether people who represent graphical information spatially also represent numerical information using a spatial number line. Forty-eight adult participants carried out a series of graphical reasoning, number judgement and spatial working memory tasks. Evidence was found to suggest that people were forming spatial representations in both the number judgement and graphical reasoning tasks. Performance on the spatial memory task was positively associated with a measure of the tendency to use spatial representations on the graph task. In addition, measures of the use of spatial representations for the graph and number tasks were associated. We interpret our results as providing further evidence that people often represent graphical information by analogy to space. We conclude with a discussion of whether the use of such spatial representations is confined to any one task or is instead a general representational strategy employed by people high in spatial ability.

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