Jörn Alexander Quent 22 October 2017
Version: 1.11
License: GPL-2
URL: https://github.com/JAQuent/mentalRotation
Contact: alex.quent (at) mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk
Please recognise this work by citing it.
In this mental rotation, a trial starts with the presentation of a fixation cross for 250 msec (as in Shepard & Metzler, 1971), after which the target (i.e. mirrored or not-mirrored) and the rotated probe follow on the left and on the right, respectively. Subjects are asked to press the left arrow key if the stimulus on the left is mirrored and the right arrow key if the stimulus is not mirrored. The maximum presentation time is currently set to 8000 msec. If this time elapsed, the trial will be coded as no response. Reaction times, hits, false alarms, misses, correct rejections are recorded (see data analysis section). The instructions are in German.
Non-verbal stimuli - eight 8-points shapes (number 14, 15, 17, 18, 20, 22, 23, and 27) and two 12-points shapes (number 20 and 24) taken from Vanderplas and Garvin (1959) - are presented in this mental rotation task. The stimuli are presented in black on a white background. The same stimulus is shown on the screen two times. The stimulus on the left is horizontally mirrored on half of the trials, while the stimulus on the stimulus on the right side is rotated either 0, 60, 120, 180, 240 or 300 degrees. The experiment is divided into two blocks. A block consisted of every possible combination of the ten stimuli with the six rotation angles and both mirrored horizontally or left unchanged. Thus, there are 240 trials in total. If you have more questions, you can contact me.
- Import the data:
data <- read.table("results/mentalRotation_example.dat",
header= FALSE)
names(data) <- c('subjectNumber', 'date', 'time', 'trialNumber', 'stimulus', 'block', 'rotationAngle', 'mirrored', 'response', 'correctness', 'RT', 'fixationOnsetTimte','stimulusOnsetTime', 'stimulusOffsetTime')
data$rotationAngle <- as.factor(data$rotationAngle)
head(data)## subjectNumber date time trialNumber stimulus block rotationAngle
## 1 1 20171022 100715 1 11 1 60
## 2 1 20171022 100715 2 6 1 240
## 3 1 20171022 100715 3 17 1 240
## 4 1 20171022 100715 4 9 1 60
## 5 1 20171022 100715 5 8 1 60
## 6 1 20171022 100715 6 19 1 240
## mirrored response correctness RT fixationOnsetTimte
## 1 0 1 2 1513.872 14.10068
## 2 0 0 4 1075.891 15.34751
## 3 1 1 1 1708.920 16.54261
## 4 0 0 4 2277.963 16.22813
## 5 0 0 4 1200.980 16.42355
## 6 1 1 1 3879.166 16.20884
## stimulusOnsetTime stimulusOffsetTime
## 1 280.7125 1797.828
## 2 282.1128 1365.434
## 3 283.3211 2000.124
## 4 282.9717 2566.638
## 5 283.0982 1499.824
## 6 282.8440 4166.258
ggplot(data, aes(x = rotationAngle, y = RT)) +
geom_boxplot() + labs(x = 'Rotation angle in degrees', y = 'Reaction time in msec', title = 'Example data')
hits <- sum(data$correctness == 1)/240
falseAlarms <- sum(data$correctness == 2)/240
misses <- sum(data$correctness == 3)/240
correctRejections <- sum(data$correctness == 4)/240
hits## [1] 0.45
falseAlarms## [1] 0.0875
misses## [1] 0
correctRejections## [1] 0.4625
Leeuwis N, Paas A andAlimardani M (2021) Vividness of Visual Imagery and Personality Impact Motor-Imagery Brain Computer Interfaces. Front. Hum. Neurosci. 15:634748.doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2021.634748
Leeuwis, N., and Alimardani, M. (2020). High aptitude motor imagery BCI users have better visuospatial memory. arXiv [Preprint]. arXiv:2010.02026.
Shepard, R. N., & Metzler, J. (1971). Mental Rotation of Three-Dimensional Objects. Science, 171(3972), 701–703. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.171.3972.701
Vanderplas, J. M., & Garvin, E. A. (1959). The association value of random shapes. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 57(3), 147–154. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0048723
Mental rotation task.
Copyright (C) 2017 Jörn Alexander Quent
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