title: Mental animation in the visuospatial sketchpad: evidence from dual-task studies.
abstract: We used the dual-task paradigm to provide evidence that inferring the motion of a component of a mechanical system (mental animation) is a spatial visualization process. In two experiments, participants were asked to solve mental animation problems while simultaneously retaining either a visuospatial working memory load (a configuration of dots in a grid) or a verbal memory load (a list of letters). Both experiments showed that mental animation interferes more with memory for a concurrent visuospatial load than with memory for a verbal load. Experiment 1 also showed that a visuospatial working memory load interferes more with mental animation than does a verbal memory load. Furthermore, Experiment 2 showed that mental animation interferes more with a visuospatial memory load than does a verbal reasoning task that takes approximately the same amount of time.
authors.affiliation: Psychology Department, Cedar Crest College, Allentown, PA 18104, USA. vksims@ccc-s.cedarcrest.edu
authors.forename: V K
authors.initials: VK
authors.lastname: Sims
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hegarty
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination / Q000502:physiology*; D008128:Logic; D008568:Memory / Q000502:physiology*; D009039:Motion Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D011340:Problem Solving / Q000502:physiology*; D014706:Verbal Learning / Q000502:physiology*