Training Spatial Ability in Virtual Reality

Abstract: Background: Spatial reasoning has been identified as a critical skill for success in STEM. Unfortunately, under-represented groups often have lower incoming spatial ability. Courses that improve spatial skills exist but are not widely used. Virtual reality (VR) has been suggested as a possible tool for teaching spatial reasoning since students are more accurate and complete spatial tasks more quickly in three dimensions. However, no prior work has developed or evaluated a fully-structured VR spatial skills course. Objectives: We seek to assess the effectiveness of teaching spatial reasoning in VR, both in isolation as a structured training curriculum and also in comparison to traditional methods. Methods: We adapted three modules of an existing pencil-and-paper course to VR, leveraging educational scaffolding and real-time feedback in the design. We evaluated our three-week course in a study with $n=24$ undergraduate introductory STEM students, capturing both quantitative spatial ability gains (using pre- and post test scores on validated assessments) and qualitative insights (from a post-study questionnaire). We also compared our VR course to an offering of a baseline non-VR course (using data collected in a previous study). Results and Conclusions: Students who took our VR course had significant spatial ability gains. Critically, we find no significant difference in outcomes between our VR course (3 meetings of 120 minutes each) and a baseline pencil and paper course (10 meetings of 90 minutes each), suggesting that spatial reasoning can be very efficiently taught in VR. We observed cybersickness at lower rates than are generally reported and most students reported enjoying learning in VR.