VISUALIZATIONS IN THE PROCESS OF TEACHING AND LEARNING

Visualizing information plays an important role in the process of teac hing and learning. Nevertheless, there is not much information availab le yet on how a subject matter should be visualized and which kind of visualization is best suited for specific purposes. Traditional theori es of text and picture comprehension do not provide an adequate basis for answering this question. An alternative theoretical approach is de scribed which considers comprehension of visualizations as a process o f structure mapping between a visuo-spatial configuration and a mental model. The empirical study carried out revealed differences in the us e of text and picture information and in the performance in answering different kinds of text items. These differences suggest that the stru cture mapping process between a visualization and a mental model entai ls not only the semantic content, but also surface characteristics of the respective graphic display.