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A gender stereotype that has some basis in research is that men are more reluctant to ask for directions than women. We wanted to investigate whether this stereotype applies to technology-related contexts, affecting older adults’ abilities to learn new technologies. To explore how help seeking and gender might relate for older adults, we conducted a controlled experiment with 36 individuals (18 men and 18 women), and observed how often they asked for help when learning new applications. We also conducted post- experiment interviews with participants. We found that although most participants stereotyped older men as being reluctant to ask for help in the interview, the difference between men and women was minimal in the experiment. Instead, other factors had a greater effect: older participants took longer to complete tasks and participants with lower technology self-efficacy asked significantly more questions.
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Developing a novel measure of non-rigid, ductile spatial skill
Abstract Non-rigid spatial thinking, or mental transformations where the distance between two points in an object changes (e.g., folding, breaking, bending), is required for many STEM fields but remains critically understudied. We developed and tested a non-rigid, ductile spatial skill measure based on reasoning about knots with 279 US adults (M = 30.90, SD 5.47 years; 76% White; 48% women). The resultant 54-item measure had good reliability (α = .88). Next, 147 US adults (M = 20.65, SD 2.80 years; 48% White; 56% women) completed existing spatial skills measures, the knot reasoning measure, a verbal skill measure, and surveys of current and childhood spatial activities. Knot reasoning performance was significantly, positively correlated with existing measures of spatial skill. Mental rotation and paper folding, but not bending, predicted knot reasoning task performance. We replicated work showing that men performed better than women on mental rotation and unexpectedly found that men also outperformed women on paper folding and knot reasoning, but not bending, tasks. Using structural equation modeling, we found several significant mediation effects. Men who reported less masculine-stereotyped spatial activity engagement had higher performance on the mental rotation and knot reasoning tasks. Women who reported greater engagement in feminine-stereotyped spatial activities had higher paper folding and backwards knot reasoning performance. Spatial skills did not differ among math-intensive STEM, non-math-intensive STEM, and non-STEM majors. The studies introduce a reliable measure of non-rigid, ductile string transformations and provide initial evidence of the role of gender and gendered spatial activities on non-rigid spatial skills.
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- PAR ID:
- 10579211
- Publisher / Repository:
- Springer Science + Business Media
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications
- Volume:
- 10
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 2365-7464
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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