Gender, visuospatial processing, and the modality effect in chemistry

Join Dr Juan Cristobal Castro, Assistant Professor in Educational Psychology, School of Education, for his hybrid seminar entitled 'Gender, visuospatial processing, and the modality effect in chemistry' from 12 - 1pm, Friday 17 May 2024.

"An explanation for why science undergraduate students do not finish their degrees is that some of these disciplines (e.g., chemistry and physics) are too demanding in visuospatial processing. These demands are even higher for female students, whose visuospatial processing tends to be hampered by negative stereotypes. Can these problems in science learning be alleviated following cognitive load theory guidelines? We investigated this question with the guideline known as the modality effect, which recommends using narrations rather than written texts as supplements for animations. Specifically, we investigated the modality effect in an experiment with 116 undergraduates (MAge = 21.5; 59% women) studying visuospatial processes of organic chemistry molecules.

"As prior knowledge is a key factor, we did not recruit participants from natural sciences majors, and students completed a pretest about organic chemistry molecules. Students also completed two tests of visuospatial processing. Randomly, 45 participants studied the chemistry animation supplemented with narration, and 71 studied the animation supplemented with written text. We found gender effects for one of the two visuospatial tests. Also, although there was no modality effect on learning, it was on working memory. Instructional implications and future research directions will be discussed."

This is a hybrid seminar, that will be streaming via Zoom: attendees can view online, or attend in-person collectively at 52 Prichatts Road, Room 412 (G9 on the campus map).

This talk is part of the ongoing Language and Cognition at Birmingham (LACAB) Psycholinguistics Seminar Series. Discover more information about LACAB and its upcoming events here.