Roberts R J, Aman C J
Department of Psychology, University of Denver, CO 80208.
Child Dev. 1993 Aug;64(4):1258-70.
The spatial referents "left" and "right" are one of the most common means for specifying direction and location, yet little is known about the processes that underlie the use of these concepts. Two studies tested the hypothesis that children and adults who correctly identify left-right directions from nonoccupied orientations perform imagined rotations to align the self's frame of reference with the other's. Children who make incorrect judgments from nonoccupied orientations were hypothesized to use a stationary egocentric reference frame. 28 6- and 8-year-old children and 9 adults were tested on a task that required making left-right direction judgments from various rotated orientations. The results supported the mental rotation hypothesis: Only correct responders showed a linear increase in response time with increasing angular disparity between the self and other. Mental rotation permits the continued use of an egocentric reference frame for specifying left-right relations from nonoccupied positions.
空间参照词“左”和“右”是指定方向和位置最常用的方式之一，但对于这些概念使用背后的过程却知之甚少。两项研究检验了以下假设：能够从非占据方向正确识别左右方向的儿童和成人会进行想象中的旋转，以使自身参照系与他人的参照系对齐。而对于从非占据方向做出错误判断的儿童，则假设他们使用的是固定的以自我为中心的参照系。对28名6岁和8岁儿童以及9名成年人进行了一项任务测试，该任务要求从各种旋转方向做出左右方向判断。结果支持了心理旋转假设：只有做出正确反应的人随着自我与他人之间角度差异的增加，反应时间呈线性增加。心理旋转允许继续使用以自我为中心的参照系从非占据位置指定左右关系。
