[Blindmath] Spatial Abilities

Wed May 28 23:48:02 UTC 2014

This is a really interesting question. I have been blind since birth
and have always had excellent verbal and quantitative skills, and
reasonable grasp of cardinal directions, but my spatial sense is very
poor. For example, when moving furniture or packing a moving truck, I
have no idea how things should be arranged. I feel I am at a
disadvantage because I can only touch or explore a large space a
little at a time, whereas a sighted person can see the whole thing at
once. This is a bit of a different problem from the 2 vs.
3-dimensional issue (although I also have trouble decoding raised
diagrams especially those with complex shapes). I can mental-map a
space easily if it's a standard square or rectangular block, but have
a lot of trouble mental-mapping a room or building that's irregularly
shaped in any way. I have met several blind people who don't have the
same degree of difficulty as I do, however, so I am hesitant to blame
it wholly on blindness. That's why I am curious to hear what other
congenitally blind people experience. I do think growing up I was
never expected to engage spatially with the world and I wasn't as
tactually inquisitive as some blind kids, so my spatial development
might have been hampered. For me there's little connection between
mathematical relationships between numbers and their graphical
analogs, which is why my math ability doesn't suffer from my spatial
impairment.

Arielle

On 5/28/14, sabra1023 via Blindmath <blindmath at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> Just because someone uses three-dimensional objects doesn't mean that they
> have a low spatial intelligence necessarily. I believe that for spatial IQ
> tests for the blind, it is best practice to use three-dimensional objects.
>
>> On May 28, 2014, at 1:13 PM, Amanda Lacy <lacy925 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I think it has to do with the fact that those of us who are blind from
>> birth don't experience the world as being flat. Sight involves the
>> projection of light onto a flat retina, so for sighted people it seems
>> natural to go from there to representing real things on flat surfaces.
>> Flat pictures are everywhere for them since birth, but I can't think of
>> one single example of anything in the real world that's flat. Our hands
>> are designed to grasp and rotate and examine real objects, and then we
>> come to school and have to learn what seems like a new language. So when
>> people say that my hands are like their eyes, I have to disagree. I'm
>> speculating as someone who has never been sighted, so any of you can feel
>> free to correct me with more accurate information.
>>
>> Amanda
>>> On 5/28/2014 12:46 PM, sabra1023 via Blindmath wrote:
>>> I wonder if being blind from birth has to do with it. If I'm remembering
>>> how to get somewhere, I just imagine myself walking there. A map doesn't
>>> help. I can imagine three-dimensional things very well and make them out
>>> of clay. Also, I can remember a two dimensional shape like a circle or
>>> square. However, it's difficult for me to imagine and manipulate graphs
>>> in my head.
>>>
>>>> On May 28, 2014, at 12:07 PM, Susan Jolly via Blindmath
>>>> <blindmath at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> There have been a large number of conferences about and studies of the
>>>> use of tactile maps and diagrams by blind persons.  This has been going
>>>> on for more than 40 years.  What I got out of reading many of the
>>>> studies is that different people are different.
>>>>
>>>> There is, however, a lot of evidence that men have better spatial
>>>> abilities than women.  I know this is controversial but I think there is
>>>> some truth to it.  I can see the sun come up east of my house and go
>>>> down west of my house.  Nonetheless, no matter how hard I try, I cannot
>>>> imagine that my son who lives 1000 miles west of me lives in the
>>>> direction where the sun goes down.  I know that it is true logically but
>>>> when I think about him, he's always somewhere off to the east in my
>>>> mind.
>>>>
>>>> As for graphs, it took me years to understand why it is not necessary
>>>> when laying out a two-dimensional graph to use the same spacing for both
>>>> axes.  I mention this here for two reasons.  First, it is an example of
>>>> different people being different.  Second, it points out that the shape
>>>> of a graph is to some extent arbitrary.  Of course, the general shape is
>>>> independent of the exact choice of layout. (I'm talking about linear
>>>> axes; you can dramatically change the shape if you use non-linear axes
>>>> such as logarithmic ones.)
>>>>
>>>> SusanJ
>>>>
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>
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