School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, Hubei 430079, China.
School of Psychology, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland 4072, Australia; Faculty of Humanities, University of Johannesburg, Auckland Park 2006, South Africa.
J Exp Child Psychol. 2024 Oct;246:105989. doi: 10.1016/j.jecp.2024.105989. Epub 2024 Jun 17.
When solving mathematical problems, young children will perform better when they can use gestures that match mental representations. However, despite their increasing prevalence in educational settings, few studies have explored this effect in touchscreen-based interactions. Thus, we investigated the impact on young children's performance of dragging (where a continuous gesture is performed that is congruent with the change in number) and tapping (involving a discrete gesture that is incongruent) on a touchscreen device when engaged in a continuous number line estimation task. By examining differences in the set size and position of the number line estimation, we were also able to explore the boundary conditions for the superiority effect of congruent gestures. We used a 2 (Gesture Type: drag or tap) × 2 (Set Size: Set 0-10 or Set 0-20) × 2 (Position: left of midpoint or right of midpoint) mixed design. A total of 70 children aged 5 and 6 years (33 girls) were recruited and randomly assigned to either the Drag or Tap group. We found that the congruent gesture (drag) generally facilitated better performance with the touchscreen but with boundary conditions. When completing difficult estimations (right side in the large set size), the Drag group was more accurate, responded to the stimulus faster, and spent more time manipulating than the Tap group. These findings suggest that when children require explicit scaffolding, congruent touchscreen gestures help to release mental resources for strategic adjustments, decrease the difficulty of numerical estimation, and support constructing mental representations.
当解决数学问题时，如果儿童能够使用与心理表象匹配的手势，他们的表现会更好。然而，尽管在教育环境中越来越普及，但很少有研究探索基于触摸屏的交互中的这种效果。因此，我们研究了在进行连续数字线估计任务时，在触摸屏设备上拖动（执行与数字变化一致的连续手势）和点击（涉及与数字变化不一致的离散手势）对幼儿表现的影响。通过检查数字线估计的集合大小和位置的差异，我们还能够探索一致手势优势效果的边界条件。我们使用了 2（手势类型：拖动或点击）×2（集合大小：集合 0-10 或集合 0-20）×2（位置：中点左侧或中点右侧）混合设计。共有 70 名 5 岁和 6 岁的儿童（33 名女孩）被招募并随机分配到拖动或点击组。我们发现，一致的手势（拖动）通常可以通过触摸屏更好地促进表现，但存在边界条件。当完成困难的估计（在大集合尺寸的右侧）时，拖动组比点击组更准确、对刺激的反应更快、花费更多时间操作。这些发现表明，当儿童需要明确的支架时，一致的触摸屏手势有助于释放策略调整的心理资源，降低数值估计的难度，并支持构建心理表象。
