The Dissociation of Small- and Large-Scale Spatial Abilities in School-Age Children

This experiment with school-age children was designed to assess the extent to which training in a “small-scale space”—so-called manual rotation training—can improve performance in a “large-scale space.” In a preliminary test, 72 9- and 10-yr.-olds completed a direction estimation test. Half of the children then completed manual rotation training or played a nonspatial computer game. All of the children subsequently performed the direction estimation test again. Performance in direction estimation did not differ between the preliminary test and the posttest. Thus, in contrast to the parallel study with adults, the “small-scale spatial ability” was not associated with “large-scale ability.”