Agreed, same here. SPOILER The consensus seems to be that 8 has more than one answer, I definitely see 8A as different from the others (arrows pointing away from each other as opposed to perpendicular), but perhaps there is another one. Brain is too tired to figure out another possibility right now; thanks for the workout :)
BTW #6 I found most difficult (even more so than #9), and #7 was far too easy for its position.
TO AUTHOR: The answer key for #6 is wrong. It should be A, not C. (The boxes are on the LHS of the frontmost arrow in A; they are on the RHS of the other three.)
The tests that have only different symbols are much easier than the ones where symbols are repeated.
For example for question 1, without actually building the whole of the cube in one's head, it's quite obvious that the circle is always on the left side of the heart, except in one case where it will be at the top, and since the cubes have to be absolutely identical one doesn't need to look further than the first difference.
(Edit: if the test is different for each taker, the above example is meaningless, of course.)
We had some requirements for the test which included graded difficulty from very easy to very hard to be able to separate out people of different abilities over a regular population.
We were supposed to design the first question so that 100% of people got it correct; to be an easy, practice type question.
I found all of them very easy except "question 6", at which I'm still failing hard to visualize the difference, and is the only one I got wrong. (I had to choose a random one)
Looking for opposing face pairs is the easy method, and works on most of the questions (I think 6 of the 9.)
If all the opposing pairs are the same, there are two more ways to distinguish. One is the placement of the symbols relative to each other; the chirality of the whole object. For an example, think of a six-sided die. Position it so that the 6 is on top and 2 is towards you. The left and right faces will be the 3 and 4, in either order, creating two distinct possibilities.
The other remaining distinction is the orientation of the symbols on each face. Continuing the die example, with the 6 on top and the 2 towards you, the 2 pips can have either of two diagonal orientations. Orientation creates a possibility space of 2^N * 4^M where N is the number of sides with 2-way orientation distinguishability and M is the number of sides with 4-way distinguishability. On a normal die, N = 3 since the 2, 3, and 6 are 2-way orientable, and M = 0. Some of the questions here have M > 0, specifically the arrows and hearts.
(I'm ignoring cases where rotating the whole cube creates duplicate possibilities. Consider one side with an arrow and 5 blank sides; although the arrow has 4 orientations, they are not distinguishable. I'm also ignoring the possibility of rotating a symbol in non-90° increments.)
What I have found is that the higher intelligence/spatial ability type people are able to use these types of techniques on more difficult questions. I do very well on traditional spatial tests because they are trivial with relational or structural comparison.
Here is a real challenge.. can you think of a design for a spatial ability test (that is able to be done on pen/paper) that does not allow for this type of strategy? :)
9/9, first try. Here's how I solved each one (rot13 to avoid unintentional spoilers):
1. Vf gur Fdhner arkg gb gur Pvepyr?
2. Bevrag gur phor fb gung gur Urneg vf va abezny cbfvgvba (gvc qbja) snpvat lbh. Jung funcr vf ba gur yrsg snpr?
3. Jung funcr vf bccbfvgr gur Pvepyr?
4. Vf gur Neebj cbvagvat ng gur Pvepyr? 5. Vf gur Neebj cbvagvat ng gur Pvepyr? 6. Bevrag gur phor fb gur pvepyr jvgu gur neebj cbvagvat njnl sebz vg vf snpvat lbh, naq gung neebj vf ba gbc, cbvagvat njnl sebz lbh. Jung funcr vf ba gur evtug snpr? 7. Bevrag gur phor fb gur pvepyr vf snpvat lbh. Gur neebj vf cbvagvat gbjneq gur urneg va jung bevragngvba? 8. Vf gurer n gevnatyr cbvagvat ng n pvepyr? 9. Rnpu phor unf ybbc bs 4 snprf pbafvfgvat bs n oynax fheebhaqrq ol 3 urnegf. Ner obgu urnegf ba rvgure fvqr bs gur oynax cbvagvat va gur fnzr qverpgvba (abegu fbhgu rnfg jrfg hc qbja)?
Not sure if this is the kind of spatial ability they're trying to test.
My head hurts now. An interesting test of one's ability to hold a detailed object in short term memory while confusing yourself with speculations and arguments... Knowing psychologists, though, the real test was probably something quite different.
If it was being timed, perhaps I shouldn't have gone and made myself a coffee halfway through.
Hmmm, 2 out of 9 and no feedback? I have to say I find that deeply frustrating :)
Also, I have no idea what you're collecting data for or anything; I just gave you my time, please let me know what you've done with it. Hope you get the results you wanted.
Edit: Apparently I scored 8/9, which is less frustrating :)
This is for a psych project. It is quite a bit harder than most spatial ability tests. Most spatial ability tests are easy to do with non-spatial methods. We have designed this item format to (hopefully) not be the case.
Our results so far have shown that not having a time limit doesn't affect the results substantially either, unlike most other spatial tests. It is a test of what you are able to do rather than how quickly you can do something.
I'm fairly certain that for my Q8 (2 squares, 2 circles & 2 triangles on each), there was no unique odd one out. For A & C the triangles pointed opposite directions when assembled, and B & D they pointed in the same direction.
Holy shit. I managed to focus for four, got told I only had one right, which surprises me. That may very well be the hardest reasoning test I've ever seen.
I'm not sure it takes into consideration the orientation of the image, I was using that as a short cut - E.G. arrow points to circle and such.
This made about half of them solvable by inspection in under 15 seconds for me. However the result was 1 out of 9. Using this same approach the 8th question was obviously flawed, I wasn't about to go back and try a different method at that point though.
I originally uploaded the incorrect items, of which one contained a flaw (I scored it as correct for everyone in that early group).
In the easy questions you can indeed use those structural techniques, but in the harder ones you couldn't.
In the 'gold standard' spatial tests that currently exist you can use these kinds of queues for almost every item very easily, which is why we introduced this method.
Also, we need to take into account the vastly higher than average intelligence at HN compared to the general population; you guys are outrageously outperforming undergraduate psych students so far :-)
This is excruciatingly difficult. I have no experience with this sort of a test, and the method that I chose (albeit quickly and without a whole lot of thought) was to pick four sides that were touching, and try to find the one pattern that didn't have the same four sides touching.
This logic obviously didn't work, because I got 1 / 9. Does anyone have a strategy for this, or is it pure logic?
For those of you that took the test earlier, go to http://psych.io/spatial/scores.php for your correct score. It will work as long as you have the same IP as beofre. Sorry again about the mix up to start.
And thankyou so much to everyone that is doing this!
I may as well link you guys to http://cube.asher.io as well. It only works in chrome though! It is a web page that I banged up in a night that we used to create the items. No instructions on it though - try drag and drop :D
Took my time (around 10 mins) and got 8/9
Decided to make a new try selecting randomly (around 10 seconds) and got 4/9.
Old lesson from engineering school reminded: usually the most accurate is not the most cost effective solution.
It is a test to see the frustration of people seeing 8/9 when they are sure of their answers (BBACCADAA).
The answer to http://psych.io/spatial/hard.jpg is A.
It seems broken to me. 1 of 9 and I'm normally off the charts on spatial ability. It was sitting in my browser window for a while but that shouldn't matter if the problem was a wrong answer key.
4/9. I was fighting impatience for a good deal of the time. This may be intentional, but if not, some added context as to the purpose may have given me more reason to focus. Or not ;-)
8/9 the best way is IMHO not trying to build the 3d mental cube but moving and rotating the faces to the same axis and then compare. The 3d memtal model is elusive sometimes
[+] [-] NathanKP|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] colanderman|14 years ago|reply
BTW #6 I found most difficult (even more so than #9), and #7 was far too easy for its position.
TO AUTHOR: The answer key for #6 is wrong. It should be A, not C. (The boxes are on the LHS of the frontmost arrow in A; they are on the RHS of the other three.)
[+] [-] bambax|14 years ago|reply
The tests that have only different symbols are much easier than the ones where symbols are repeated.
For example for question 1, without actually building the whole of the cube in one's head, it's quite obvious that the circle is always on the left side of the heart, except in one case where it will be at the top, and since the cubes have to be absolutely identical one doesn't need to look further than the first difference.
(Edit: if the test is different for each taker, the above example is meaningless, of course.)
[+] [-] asher_|14 years ago|reply
We had some requirements for the test which included graded difficulty from very easy to very hard to be able to separate out people of different abilities over a regular population.
We were supposed to design the first question so that 100% of people got it correct; to be an easy, practice type question.
Also, you guys aren't even getting to see our hardest questions :D Take a look at http://psych.io/spatial/hard.jpg for example!
[+] [-] petdog|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] asher_|14 years ago|reply
My greatest apologies for those who didn't get a correct score back, ill put up your scores with the last half of your IP addresses very soon!
[+] [-] josephg|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jasonkostempski|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] T-hawk|14 years ago|reply
If all the opposing pairs are the same, there are two more ways to distinguish. One is the placement of the symbols relative to each other; the chirality of the whole object. For an example, think of a six-sided die. Position it so that the 6 is on top and 2 is towards you. The left and right faces will be the 3 and 4, in either order, creating two distinct possibilities.
The other remaining distinction is the orientation of the symbols on each face. Continuing the die example, with the 6 on top and the 2 towards you, the 2 pips can have either of two diagonal orientations. Orientation creates a possibility space of 2^N * 4^M where N is the number of sides with 2-way orientation distinguishability and M is the number of sides with 4-way distinguishability. On a normal die, N = 3 since the 2, 3, and 6 are 2-way orientable, and M = 0. Some of the questions here have M > 0, specifically the arrows and hearts.
(I'm ignoring cases where rotating the whole cube creates duplicate possibilities. Consider one side with an arrow and 5 blank sides; although the arrow has 4 orientations, they are not distinguishable. I'm also ignoring the possibility of rotating a symbol in non-90° increments.)
[+] [-] asher_|14 years ago|reply
Here is a real challenge.. can you think of a design for a spatial ability test (that is able to be done on pen/paper) that does not allow for this type of strategy? :)
[+] [-] bumbledraven|14 years ago|reply
Not sure if this is the kind of spatial ability they're trying to test.
[+] [-] cormullion|14 years ago|reply
If it was being timed, perhaps I shouldn't have gone and made myself a coffee halfway through.
[+] [-] Robin_Message|14 years ago|reply
Also, I have no idea what you're collecting data for or anything; I just gave you my time, please let me know what you've done with it. Hope you get the results you wanted.
Edit: Apparently I scored 8/9, which is less frustrating :)
[+] [-] asher_|14 years ago|reply
Our results so far have shown that not having a time limit doesn't affect the results substantially either, unlike most other spatial tests. It is a test of what you are able to do rather than how quickly you can do something.
[+] [-] screwt|14 years ago|reply
I'm fairly certain that for my Q8 (2 squares, 2 circles & 2 triangles on each), there was no unique odd one out. For A & C the triangles pointed opposite directions when assembled, and B & D they pointed in the same direction.
[+] [-] colanderman|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] josephg|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Vivtek|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] antoko|14 years ago|reply
This made about half of them solvable by inspection in under 15 seconds for me. However the result was 1 out of 9. Using this same approach the 8th question was obviously flawed, I wasn't about to go back and try a different method at that point though.
[+] [-] asher_|14 years ago|reply
In the easy questions you can indeed use those structural techniques, but in the harder ones you couldn't.
In the 'gold standard' spatial tests that currently exist you can use these kinds of queues for almost every item very easily, which is why we introduced this method.
Also, we need to take into account the vastly higher than average intelligence at HN compared to the general population; you guys are outrageously outperforming undergraduate psych students so far :-)
[+] [-] vorbby|14 years ago|reply
This logic obviously didn't work, because I got 1 / 9. Does anyone have a strategy for this, or is it pure logic?
[+] [-] shrikant|14 years ago|reply
This didn't work for exactly 3 of them (the ones with repeated symbols), so went with educated guesses there.
Curiously, I got 6/9.
[+] [-] morrow|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] asher_|14 years ago|reply
And thankyou so much to everyone that is doing this!
[+] [-] spacec0wb0y|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] asher_|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pchaso|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] webreac|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Pechtel|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ryanklee|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] omegant|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arien|14 years ago|reply
A pity the test didn't say which ones I failed, though.