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Investigating the foundations of spatial thinking in meteorology

ABSTRACT A survey with nine meteorological charts, maps, and images from a 2015 significant weather event was administered to meteorologists (N = 93) to identify which spatial thinking skills they report using with each chart, map, and image. Results reveal high reported use of mental animation (74.6%), disembedding (72.4%), and perspective taking (71.6%) with the meteorological charts, maps, and images. Lower rates accompany reported use of object location memory, visual penetrative ability, and mental rotation, contrasting with the prominence of these skills in geology. Analysis of response patterns reveals significant independence between student and professional groups. The majority (70.2%) of student meteorologists reported they do not use mental animation when working with a surface analysis chart; however, 67.9% of professional meteorologists reported that they do. This striking finding likely results from professionals’ extensive mental catalogs of weather scenarios that allow predicting future scenarios, which student meteorologists lack. Similarly, student meteorologists reported using disembedding with the surface analysis chart at much lower rates (56.8%) than professional meteorologists (82.1%), suggesting that students focus on interpreting the chart's superficial features and less on disembedding deeper patterns. These results provide intriguing contrasts to comparable investigations in geologic thinking, contribute to a growing understanding of the application of spatial skills in STEM, and will inform further investigation into spatial thinking in meteorology.