UNDERSTANDING GENDER DIFFERENCES ON THE WATER-LEVEL PROBLEM - THE ROLE OF SPATIAL PERCEPTION

Four experiments with undergraduates examined possible sources of the gender differences routinely found on the water-level problem among adults. The nature of subjects' errors offered no evidence that less accurate responses by females reflect a less developed Piagetian spatial system, nor did the data suggest that their requisite motor skills are poorer than those of males. Across four nonphysical versions of the problem in which subjects drew horizontal or vertical lines within tilted rectangles, males were more accurate, thus disconfirming the earlier hypothesis that knowledge of the effects of gravity on water is the sole factor differentiating the sexes on this task. A role for spatial perception processes found support in gender differences on stimuli that were of different shapes and tilted at different angles. A relationship was also found between knowledge of the relevant physical principle and accuracy on the horizontal and vertical nonphysical tasks, raising the possibility that spatial perception abilities underlie both.