Facilitating recognition of spatial structures through animation and the role of mental rotation ability

The study examined the facilitating function of animations for the recognition of rotated spatial structures and considered the role of mental rotation ability. The task required a decision of whether a rotated version of a spatial structure was identical to a previously shown structure. Either a static picture of the spatial structure or an animation was studied. The animation presented a rotation of the structure. Results showed a large effect of animations for recognition times. Individual mental rotation ability was chronometrically measured based on reaction times in a standard mental rotation task with simple two-dimensional figures. An aptitude–treatment-interaction was found: Mental rotation ability explained a large portion of the variance in recognition times for rotated spatial structures with static study pictures (r2 = .52) but it explained variance to a much lesser extent with animations (r2 = .12). It was concluded that animations compensated for lower mental rotation ability.