Cognitive style in visual imagery and its possible effects on coping with math and other problems

While preparing the last of my series of cognitive ability presentations (which will be about visual spatial processing), I 

read the following readable paper:

Spatial versus object visualizers:  a new characterization of visual cognitive style.  Kozhevnikov, M., Kosslyn, S., and 

Shepard, J.  Memory and Cognition 2005, 33(4), 710-726.

http://nmr.mgh.harvard.edu/mkozhevnlab/wp-content/uploads/pdfs/spatial_versus2005.pdf

Cognitive style refers to the consistency with which a person acquires and processes information.  Examples of cognitive styles would be field dependence/independence, reflectiveness/ impulsivity  and visualizers / verbalizers.  The paper claims that while performing cognitive tasks, visualizers rely more on visual images while verbalizers rely more on analytic strategies.

Krutetzkii suggested that people can be classified according to the way they process mathematical information.  People with an analytic style prefer to solve math problems in logical and verbal ways.  People who have a "geometric" style prefer to use visual imagery. 

It's not clear to me whether this classification between verbalizers and visualizers is sufficiently supported by research.

The paper divides the visualizers into two subgroups: visualizers who are good at processing spatial relations and 

visualizers who are good at processing object features.  The former will find their way to a destination by creating a mental map.  The latter will find their way by visualizing prominent objects that will function as milestones along the 

way.

This division is supported by neuropsychological findings.  

Different brain areas are activated while people visualize, for instance, a route on a map they had studied previously (a task which activates parietal areas) and objects, faces or colors (a task which activates temporal areas).

Some elementary school children use spatial schematic representations to solve math problems, while others use

pictorial object representations.  Children using spatial schematic representations do better on these problems.

The article claims that visualizers who are good at processing spatial relations have a high spatial ability.  These people tend to decode and process stimuli analytically, part by part, to create abstract schematic images and to use spatial relations to analyze the stimuli features.  They are able to image spatial transformations of the objects in space (like in mental rotation tasks). 

Visualizers who are good at processing object features have a poorer spatial ability.  They tend to process visual information globally, as a single perceptual unit, and to form static images (for example of a scenery or objects) that are very vivid and detailed.  These people will succeed at tasks requiring object recognition, memory and gestalt closure, and will be better painters. 

The paper tries to verify these hypotheses by a series of pictorial studies (which I will not describe here).

The paper has an interesting appendix with items from a 
visualizer – verbalizer questionnaire.  The items are math problems which can be solved through a visual representation (schematic or pictorial) or through verbalizing.  After solving the problems, the child/person is asked what way or ways he used (a formula, visual imagery of the objects in the problem, a diagram and so forth).  The child can add other ways he used.

Perhaps if we'll help children find the cognitive style they use to cope with math or other problems (verbalizing, spatial visualizing or pictorial visualizing), they'll be able to use this insight as a strategy that will help them solve such problems in the ways that will be the most effective for them.