How psycho-social and laterality factors interact to influence gender difference of spatial ability

1999 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

• Project/Area Number: 10610108
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: 教育・社会系心理学
• Research Institution: Aichi University of Education
• Principal Investigator: TAKEHCHI Yoshiaki Aichi University of Education, Department of Psychology, Associate Professor, 教育学部, 助教授 (40216867)
• Project Period (FY): 1998 – 1999
• Keywords: spatial ability / mental rotation / gender difference / psycho difference / psycho-social factors / gender stereotype / laterality / learning experience

Research Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine how laterality factors as biological variables and psycho-social factors including gender stereotypes interact to influence gender-based individual difference of spatial ability. As laterality variables, while hand-use preference was based on handedness and family handedness questionnaires, the measures of latent laterality were hand and arm folding. Subjects were undergraduate and junior high students. Vandeberg and Kuse's (1978) Mental Rotations Test (MRT) score was adopted as the measure of spatial ability. The main results were as follow's : (1) In undergraduate subjects, while non-right hander's MRT score was superior to right handers' in "science" majors, the reverse was the case in "arts" majors. (2) Although there was no main effect of each latent handedness on mental rotation performance, interactions of hand and arm folding were significant in arts majored male undergraduates and female junior high student. In both subgroups, the subjects whose lateral side of hand and arm folding were coincident made higher score in MRT than non-coincidents. It is necessary to make the model to explain these results in integrated way. Further experiments will be carried out in the future.