Embodied cognition, science education, and visuospatial processing

Embodied cognition acknowledges that cognition does not only happen in the mind, but also in the body and environment. When they act together, such as when executing or observing human actions, several cognitive processes can be boosted. In this chapter, we describe diverse research perspectives to explain and predict embodied phenomena. We have grouped these non-mutually exclusive perspectives under two groups. The first category concerns phenomena that are only activated by executing human movements, which includes the three perspectives of offloaded cognition, generative learning, and physical activity. The second category deals with events that can be triggered by either executing or observing human motion, called here survival cognition, social cognition, and signaling. After these explanations, we address the embodied actions of manipulations and gestures, and how executing and observing these hand actions can be effective for science learning and visuospatial processing. A consistent finding in this research literature is that executing manipulations and gestures is more effective than only observing them. There is also accumulating evidence that manipulations and gestures could be more promising for students achieving lower results in visuospatial processing tests. We finish the chapter by providing instructional implications and future research directions.