Some descriptions of learning represent the process as the development of organisations of elements. Various organisations have been proposed, for example, schemata and conceptual structures. Such representations assume that mental entities, such as concepts, are sufficiently stable and differentiated to be treated as units. We discuss these…

Students hold a variety of initial (mis)conceptions that are inconsistent with scientific knowledge and hinder their physics learning. The initial (mis)conceptions could coexist with the scientific ones, even after a conceptual change. Inhibitory control may help overcome initial (mis)conceptions. This study investigated if and how inhibitory…

Someone in a car moving at constant speed along a smooth, straight road cannot perceive movement unless he looks out a window. When the person looks out and sees another car traveling alongside, in the same direction and at an equal speed, he will think that the other car is not moving either. When we see a tree in the distance as we are driving…

The simple task of bouncing a ball on a racket offers a model system for studying how human actors exploit the physics and information of the environment to control their behavior. Previous work shows that people take advantage of a passively stable solution for ball bouncing but can also use perceptual information to actively stabilize bouncing.…

Although Newton's laws of motion are well known, studies have shown that many people have misconceptions about the motions of objects. Subjects of these studies tend to follow a theory held in the three centuries before Newton (impetus theory). This theory and studies examining misconceptions about motion are discussed. (JN)

Discusses how an individual's visual system processes cues to motion in depth. A theoretical model of the operations of the visual system that underlie the perception of motion in depth is included. (HM)