Getting it right takes time: response time and performance in secondary school students

Abstract

The relation between response time and performance in cognitive tasks is increasingly evident. In the present study, we analyzed the effect of participants’ spontaneous speed when responding to a mental rotation task. We carried out a data reanalysis from a previous study where a training of 3 practice sessions of 100 trials each was applied. The procedure was applied to a sample of 21 high school students (11 boys, 10 girls). The relation between response time and performance (hits) across the training trials was analyzed. In addition, we carried out a regression analysis of performance on the learning task as a function of response time on that same task, as well as with the score on two previously applied tests of spatial intelligence and fluid intelligence. Results showed, (a) a significant relationship (r = 0.624) between response time and hits, (b) that the group of participants with longer response times performed better; (c) that participants’ response time explained most of the variance of their score on the training task in the regression analysis, although spatial and fluid intelligence scores improved the prediction of performance. Our results suggest that the reflective style achieves greater performance in solving spatial tasks, which could have important practical implications to promote a slower and more reflective style when solving school tasks with spatial components.

Keywords:

• Individual differences
• performance
• response time
• time factors (learning)
• visuospatial ability

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Colegio CEU-San Pablo Montepríncipe for granting access to the participant samples and its facilities for the application of the study. We especially wish to thank Teacher Patricia Gimeno for her help in data collection.

Authors contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by A. Rodán, P.R. Montoro and M. Romero. The first draft of the manuscript was written by M.J. Contreras and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Ethical approval

This study has received the approval of the Ethics Committee of the responsible entity, complying with all regulations in this regard.

Consent form

Informed consent was obtained from all individual adult participants included in the study.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Data availability statement

The dataset generated and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This research has received financial support for the following projects (1) RTI2018-098523-B-I00 “Learning visuospatial skills to favor equal opportunities from educational, developmental and sex perspectives” from the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, (2) PID2021-125677OB-I00 “Developmental and gender differences and clinical profile in solving spatial tasks: the role of strategy change, response speed and self- assessment” from Ministry of Science and Innovation.