TY - JOUR
T1 - The impact of presentation modes on mental rotation processing
T2 - a comparative analysis of eye movements and performance
AU - Stark, Philipp
AU - Bozkir, Efe
AU - Sójka, Weronika
AU - Huff, Markus
AU - Kasneci, Enkelejda
AU - Göllner, Richard
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2024.
PY - 2024/12
Y1 - 2024/12
N2 - Mental rotation is the ability to rotate mental representations of objects in space. Shepard and Metzler’s shape-matching tasks, frequently used to test mental rotation, involve presenting pictorial representations of 3D objects. This stimulus material has raised questions regarding the ecological validity of the test for mental rotation with actual visual 3D objects. To systematically investigate differences in mental rotation with pictorial and visual stimuli, we compared data of N=54 university students from a virtual reality experiment. Comparing both conditions within subjects, we found higher accuracy and faster reaction times for 3D visual figures. We expected eye tracking to reveal differences in participants’ stimulus processing and mental rotation strategies induced by the visual differences. We statistically compared fixations (locations), saccades (directions), pupil changes, and head movements. Supplementary Shapley values of a Gradient Boosting Decision Tree algorithm were analyzed, which correctly classified the two conditions using eye and head movements. The results indicated that with visual 3D figures, the encoding of spatial information was less demanding, and participants may have used egocentric transformations and perspective changes. Moreover, participants showed eye movements associated with more holistic processing for visual 3D figures and more piecemeal processing for pictorial 2D figures.
AB - Mental rotation is the ability to rotate mental representations of objects in space. Shepard and Metzler’s shape-matching tasks, frequently used to test mental rotation, involve presenting pictorial representations of 3D objects. This stimulus material has raised questions regarding the ecological validity of the test for mental rotation with actual visual 3D objects. To systematically investigate differences in mental rotation with pictorial and visual stimuli, we compared data of N=54 university students from a virtual reality experiment. Comparing both conditions within subjects, we found higher accuracy and faster reaction times for 3D visual figures. We expected eye tracking to reveal differences in participants’ stimulus processing and mental rotation strategies induced by the visual differences. We statistically compared fixations (locations), saccades (directions), pupil changes, and head movements. Supplementary Shapley values of a Gradient Boosting Decision Tree algorithm were analyzed, which correctly classified the two conditions using eye and head movements. The results indicated that with visual 3D figures, the encoding of spatial information was less demanding, and participants may have used egocentric transformations and perspective changes. Moreover, participants showed eye movements associated with more holistic processing for visual 3D figures and more piecemeal processing for pictorial 2D figures.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85194813712&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1038/s41598-024-60370-6
DO - 10.1038/s41598-024-60370-6
M3 - Article
C2 - 38811593
AN - SCOPUS:85194813712
VL - 14
JO - Scientific Reports
JF - Scientific Reports
IS - 1
M1 - 12329
ER -