A REDRAWN VANDENBERG AND KUSE MENTAL ROTATIONS TEST - DIFFERENT VERSIONS AND FACTORS THAT AFFECT PERFORMANCE

The available versions of the Vendenberg and Kuse (1978) Mental Rotati ons Test (MRT) have physically deteriorated because only copies of cop ies are available. We report results from a redrawn version of the MRT and for alternate versions of the test. Males perform better than fem ales, and students drawn from the physical sciences perform better tha n students drawn from the social sciences and humanities, confirming o ther reports with the original version of the MRT. Subjects find it ve ry hard to perform the MRT when stimuli require rotation along both th e top/bottom axis and the left/right axis. The magnitude of effect siz es for sex (which account, on average, for some 20% of the variance) d oes not increase with increasing difficulty of the task. Minimal strat egy effects were observed and females did not perform differently duri ng the menstrual period as opposed to the days between the menstrual p eriods. Practice effects are dramatic, confirming other reports with t he original MRT, and can also be shown to be powerful in a transfer fo r practice paradigm, where test and retest involve different versions of the MRT. Main effects of handedness on MRT performance were not fou nd. (C) 1995 Academic Press, Inc.