Landmark Positioning on a Map: An Alternative Measure of Spatial Ability for Identifying Students Who May Benefit from Learning Gross Anatomy with Virtual Reality.

This study investigates how spatial abilities, measured by the Mental Rotation Task (MRT) and the Landmark Position on a Map (LPM) test, relate to learning outcomes from monoscopic and stereoscopic virtual anatomical resources in an undergraduate gross anatomy course at Colorado State University. Results showed inconsistent but notable correlations: higher MRT scores generally aligned with better anatomy assessment performance, while LPM scores helped identify learners who might benefit more from stereoscopic virtual reality (VR) tools. Specifically, monoscopic resources (e.g., atlases and rotatable 3D models) tended to support learners with higher spatial abilities, whereas stereoscopic VR resources were more beneficial for those with lower spatial abilities. The findings suggest that educators should consider individual visuospatial abilities when selecting anatomy learning tools to optimize educational outcomes.