Geography education improves spatial ability: evidence from fMRI and behavioral experiments

ABSTRACT Previous behavior experimental studies indicate that geography education facilitates the development of students’ spatial ability. However, it is unclear how geography education shapes student brain activity and promotes spatial ability. In this article, we proposed a neuroscience-based method to explore the relationship between geography education and spatial ability. We conducted a behavioral experiment with 63 participants and an fMRI experiment with 49 participants. All the participants were divided into groups according to their undergraduate years and majors completed four spatial ability tasks. The fMRI and behavioral results revealed that after four years of geography education, students had greater mental rotation, spatial visualization and spatial relation reasoning abilities than non-geography students. The activation and functional connectivity of brain regions further indicated that geography education improved students’ spatial reference, spatial memory, visual attention and spatial decision-making. Our findings offer new neuroscience evidence that geography education can improve the spatial ability of undergraduate students, and provide new neuroimaging approach for geographic talent cultivation and curriculum assessment.