Abstract
Performance in Cooper and Shepard’s (1973) mental rotation task was examined in the context of a model that defined the extent to which alphabet letters could be tilted from their normal orientation and still be perceptually upright. For letters with a broad range of orientations for which they remain perceptually upright, a nonlinear effect of orientation on reaction time was obtained (as in Cooper and Shepard). However, for letters with a narrow range of orientations for which they remain perceptually upright, reaction time was linearly related to orientation. The results supported the hypothesis that subjects in the Cooper and Shepard task would mentally rotate alphabet letters only when they were presented in orientations for which they were not perceptually upright.
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The results of this study were reported at the annual meeting of the Psychonomic Society, Washington, D.C., 1977.
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Hock, H.S., Tromley, C.L. Mental rotation and perceptual uprightness. Perception & Psychophysics 24, 529–533 (1978). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03198779
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03198779