Visual comparison is a key process in everyday learning and reasoning. Recent research has discovered the spatial alignment principle, based on the broader framework of structure-mapping theory in comparison. According to the spatial alignment principle, visual comparison is more efficient when the figures being compared are arranged in…

When a visual search target frequently appears in one target-rich region of space, participants learn to search there first, resulting in faster reaction time when the target appears there than when it appears elsewhere. Most research on this location probability learning (LPL) effect uses 2-dimensional (2D) search environments that are distinct…

Visual search is faster when a fixed target location is paired with a spatially invariant (vs. randomly changing) distractor configuration, thus indicating that repeated contexts are learned, thereby guiding attention to the target (contextual cueing [CC]). Evidence for memory-guided attention has also been revealed with electrophysiological…

The visual system can learn statistical regularities and form search habits that guide attention to a region where a target frequently appears. Although regularities in the real world can change over time, little is known about how such changes affect habit learning. Using a location probability learning task, we demonstrated that a constant…

Orientation, the spatial organization of animal behavior, is an essential faculty of animals. Bacteria and lower animals such as insects exhibit taxis, innate orientation behavior, directly toward or away from a directional cue. Organisms can also orient themselves at a specific angle relative to the cues. In this study, using…

Although relational reasoning has been described as a process at the heart of human cognition, the exact character of relational representations remains an open debate. Symbolic-connectionist models of relational cognition suggest that relations are structured representations, but that they are ultimately grounded in feature sets; thus, they…

Recent empirical and theoretical work has depicted a close relationship between visual attention and visual working memory. For example, rehearsal in spatial working memory depends on spatial attention, whereas adding a secondary spatial working memory task impairs attentional deployment in visual search. These findings have led to the proposal…

During the first 5 years of life, the versatility, breadth, and fidelity with which children imitate change dramatically. Currently, there is no model to explain what underlies such significant changes. To that end, the present study examined whether task-independent but domain-specific--elemental--imitation mechanism explains performance across…

Observation of another person executing an action primes the same action in the observer's motor system. Recent evidence has shown that these priming effects are flexible, where training of new associations, such as making a foot response when viewing a moving hand, can reduce standard action priming effects (Gillmeister, Catmur, Liepelt, Brass,…

This research examined whether visual and haptic map learning yield functionally equivalent spatial images in working memory, as evidenced by similar encoding bias and updating performance. In 3 experiments, participants learned 4-point routes either by seeing or feeling the maps. At test, blindfolded participants made spatial judgments about the…

Research suggests that nonlinguistic sequence learning abilities are an important contributor to language development (Conway, Bauernschmidt, Huang, & Pisoni, 2010). The current study investigated visual sequence learning (VSL) as a possible predictor of vocabulary development in infants. Fifty-eight 8.5-month-old infants were presented with a…

Objective: The Kulhavy model for text learning using organized spatial displays proposes that learning will be increased when participants view visual images prior to related text. In contrast to previous studies, this study also included students who exhibited symptoms of ADHD. Method: Participants were presented with either a map-text or…

Human infants develop a variety of attentional mechanisms that allow them to extract relevant information from a cluttered multimodal world. We know that both social and nonsocial cues shift infants' attention, but not how these cues differentially affect learning of multimodal events. Experiment 1 used social cues to direct 8- and 4-month-olds'…

Learning requires applying limited working memory and attentional resources to intrinsic, germane, and extraneous aspects of the learning task. To reduce the especially undesirable extraneous load aspects of learning environments, cognitive load theorists suggest that spatially integrated learning materials should be used instead of spatially…

Does learning to read influence one's visual skill? In Study 1, kindergartners from Hong Kong, Korea, Israel, and Spain were tested on word reading and a task of visual spatial skill. Chinese and Korean kindergartners significantly outperformed Israeli and Spanish readers on the visual task. Moreover, in all cultures except Korea, good readers…