This study examined how students' perceptions of silhouette drawings of various weights would change when descriptors of Likert-like endpoints describing heavy and thin weights were changed. Subjects were 211 college students who completed one of five forms of a questionnaire differing only in endpoint descriptors. Results are discussed. (MT)

Reviews salient studies done on students' drawings of scientists and the perceptions revealed therein since Mead and Metraux's seminal study in 1947. Summarizes what this body of research has not revealed and what seems to lie ahead, including implications for science education. (Author/KHR)

Butler (1980) compared errors representing intrusions and mislocalizations on 3x3 letter displays under pattern-mask versus no-mask conditions and found that pattern masking increased character mislocalization errors (naming a character in the display but not in the target position as being the target) over intrusion errors (naming a character not…

A scheme, using features in a cartoon-like human face to represent variables, is tested as to its ability to graphically depict multivariate data. A factor analysis of Harman's "24 Psychological Tests" was performed and yielded four orthogonal factors. Nose width represented the loading on Factor 1; eye size on Factor 2; curve of mouth…

The extent to which sex differences on a mental rotation test were related to ocular dominance, handedness, and familial handedness was explored. The Vandenberg revision of the Shepard-Metzlar mental rotation test was administered to 206 college students. The test consisted of 20 criterion figures, each followed by two correct and two incorrect…

Presents a study which investigated the perception of music majors and nonmusic majors concerning their ability to discriminate the way in which altered musical excerpts differed in pitch or tempo (or both) from preceding presentations. Concludes that both groups responded similarly across conditions and replications, and that tempo changes were…

Investigated the tempo note preferences of 100 randomly selected college-level musicians using familiar orchestral music as stimuli. Subjects heard selections at increased, decreased, and unaltered tempi. Results showed musicians were not accurate in estimating original tempo and showed consistent preference for faster than actual tempo.…

Investigates perceptions of the universe of (n=232) first-year physics students from two South African universities. Compared results with Aristotelian and Newtonian views as well as with those of children as revealed in a literature survey. Results also showed that a statistically significant larger number of African than European students have…

Inspection times for both auditory and visual stimuli were correlated with verbal and nonverbal intelligence. Correlations were -.3188 and -.0929 for auditory and visual inspection times with verbal intelligence, and -.2322 and -.2676 with nonverbal intelligence. Results do not support claims that inspection time is closely related to…

The relationship between creativity and perception was examined in two studies that correlated a combined total of 11 tests of perception (e.g., figure-ground and physiognomy) and creativity (e.g., remote associates and figure preferences). Four of the tests dealt with perception, five with creativity, and two with both. Since several of the tests…

Two tests of field dependence-independence (the Embedded Figures Test and Inverted Tracing Test) are examined as potential predictors of student clinical performance. Results suggest that field-independent students may have an advantage in the clinical dental curriculum. (Author/MSE)

Examined critical features of tactile and kinesthetic processes by administering 8 traditional psychometric instruments and 14 measures of tactile and kinesthetic perceptual processes to 116 female college students in Australia. Results show, as is consistent with earlier findings, that visual-spatial processes are difficult to separate from…

This study identified the cognitive style (as defined by the construct of field independence/dependence) of prospective teachers at Eastern Kentucky University and identified instructional strategies reflective of the field independent/dependent dimension of cognitive style. In the 1984 Fall Semester the Group Embedded Figures Test was…

While researchers have made progress in understanding metaphor comprehension, less is known about the production of metaphoric language. College students (N=129) were asked to use metaphoric comparisons to describe 16 topics. They were told to imagine themselves on a trip, writing home to someone they knew well, either a peer or a child (students…

The relationship between pre-cognition and creativity was investigated in an effort to reaffirm previous findings (Costello 1977) of a correlation between these variables. A sample of 100 engineering freshmen was tested for creativity using the Torrance Test for Creative Thinking and was tested for pre-cognitive ability using the Dean-Mihalasky…