Images are central to our understanding of and learning about our world. We argue that visual training needs to be improved in the higher education system to enhance the potential of visual thinking to mediate productively our relationship with the context we inhabit. Initiatives from the social sciences and humanities since the end of the twenty…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine if university students could accurately extract information from graphs presented in 2D or 3D formats with different colour hue variations or solid black and white. Design/methodology/approach: Participants are presented with 2D and 3D bar and pie charts in a PowerPoint presentation and are asked to…

This paper is a report on a decade of teaching visual literacy at the American University (Washington, D.C.). Visual literacy is defined as an awareness that comes with appropriate development of basic visual and aural competencies. The 15 reasons for studying visual literacy are perception, drawing, expression, brain awareness, design elements,…

Reaction time and accuracy do not always reflect the same perceptual processes; therefore, the convergence of reaction time with accuracy within the context of a specific information processing model should be demonstrated empirically rather than assumed a priori. (Author/PN)

Five experiments involving a total of 44 college students addressed the effects of intercomponent consistency on skill acquisition in a class of cognitively demanding tasks requiring rapid integration of information and rapid application of rules. The role of consistency of external stimulus-to-rule linkage in facilitating learning and performing…

The notion of an "innocent eye," a naive direct view of visual reality, has a long history in art education. Faults and difficulties of this direct view are discussed, and new frames of references that have been adopted are examined. (RM)

Finds significant differences for males and females on the "Mental Rotation Test" within and across trials, but does not show a differential response to training and practice by females, as was hypothesized. (RL)

To gain a better understanding of visual perception in reading, a study tested the predictive validity of the Goodman Model of Reading by measuring the extent to which 82 college students (graduate and undergraduate) were able to perceive and accurately report 10 lines of print. It also attempted to integrate research conducted over the past 100…

The focus of this study was to measure the communicative power of business symbols with a business audience. A panel of three people selected 15 appropriate business symbols which then appeared on a questionnaire which showed each symbol with a blank space for the respondent to provide a one word or short answer of the symbol's meaning.…

The purpose of the study reported in this paper was to examine the effect of visuals possessing different amounts of realistic detail and the effects of integrating covert and overt rehearsal strategies into visually complemented prose instruction. A total of 128 university students participated in the study, which involved a prose text on the…

Organized as a bibliographic essay, this paper examines the many sources available for developing a theory of visual literacy. Several definitions are offered in order to clarify the meaning of the term "visual literacy" so that meaningful research can be conducted on the topic. Based on the review of resources, three recommendations are offered…

The patient's body is an image that medical students and residents use to process information. The classic use of images using the patient is qualitative and personal. The contemporary use of images is quantitative and impersonal. The contemporary use of imaging includes radiographic, nuclear, scintigraphic, and nuclear magnetic resonance…

This investigation into the information processing strategies of 12 profoundly/prelingually deaf college students found that subjects with oral/manual educational backgrounds had higher levels of recognition than did subjects from oral-only educational backgrounds. Highest recognition was to the left and right of the fixation point, followed by…

This study sought to determine the difference between learning with the aid of a motion picture presenting the visual field of the performer and the performer in action and learning with the aid of a motion picture presenting only the performer in action. Two motion pictures of a student tracking on a pursuit rotary unit constituted the…

This volume contains 53 articles grouped under five headings: (1) Research (14 papers on such topics as cognitive style and cognitive strategies, visual literacy training, and the impact of diagrams, type styles, and computer graphics on learning); (2) Theory (nine papers on such topics as the development of visual literacy concepts, cognition and…