Some people talk about visual thinkers and non-visual thinkers, but I am interested in a contrast within styles of visual thinking. There are people who readily visualize complicated flow charts and other diagrammatic graphics for information, but do not readily picture, say, a Möbius strip or an octahedron (let alone 4 dimensional objects).

I get this from the history of mathematics where some great examples (Richard Dedekind, Emmy Noether, Alexander Grothendieck) at first seem to be non-visual thinkers. They would seem to be algebra people rather than geometry people in terms of this question: Evidence for or against the claim that some students are "algebra people" and others are "geometry people" Yet each made great, explicit, deliberate contributions to geometry.

So I wonder if they are better described as visual in a different way than spatial visualization. Certainly Grothendieck made vast use of diagrams which are not really spatial diagrams (albeit they can be drawn on a blackboard). They are diagrams of conceptual relations.

Mathematics educators may know a lot more about this than I do, so I will not try to be more precise, unless people ask for that in comments.

My question is: where can I go to learn more about this distinction between different visual thinking/learning styles?

Some people talk about visual thinkers and non-visual thinkers, but I am interested in a contrast within styles of visual thinking. There are people who readily visualize complicated flow charts and other diagrammatic graphics for information, but do not readily picture, say, a Möbius strip or an octahedron (let alone 4 dimensional objects).

I get this from the history of mathematics where some great examples (Richard Dedekind, Emmy Noether, Alexander Grothendieck) at first seem to be non-visual thinkers. They would seem to be algebra people rather than geometry people in terms of this question: Evidence for or against the claim that some students are "algebra people" and others are "geometry people" Yet each made great, explicit, deliberate contributions to geometry.

So I wonder if they are better described as visual in a different way than spatial visualization. Certainly Grothendieck made vast use of diagrams which are not really spatial diagrams (albeit they can be drawn on a blackboard). They are diagrams of conceptual relations.

Mathematics educators may know a lot more about this than I do, so I will not try to be more precise, unless people ask for that in comments.

My question is: where can I go to learn more about this distinction between different visual thinking/learning styles?

Some people talk about visual thinkers and non-visual thinkers, but I am interested in a contrast within style of visual thinking. There are people who readily visualize complicated flow charts and other diagrammatic graphics for information, but do not readily picture, say, a Möbius strip or an octahedron (let alone 4 dimensional objects).

I get this from the history of mathematics where some great examples (Richard Dedekind, Emmy Noether, Alexander Grothendieck) at first seem to be non-visual thinkers. They would seem to be algebra people rather than geometry people in terms of this question: Evidence for or against the claim that some students are "algebra people" and others are "geometry people"

Yet each made great, explicit, deliberate contributions to geometry. And Grothendieck made vast use of diagrams which are not really spatial diagrams (albeit they can be drawn on a blackboard). They are diagrams of conceptual relations.

Mathematics educators may know a lot more about this than I do, so I will not try to be more precise, unless people ask for that in comments.

My question is: where can I go to learn more about this distinction between different visual thinking/learning styles?

Some people talk about visual thinkers and non-visual thinkers, but I am interested in a contrast within styles of visual thinking. There are people who readily visualize complicated flow charts and other diagrammatic graphics for information, but do not readily picture, say, a Möbius strip or an octahedron (let alone 4 dimensional objects).

I get this from the history of mathematics where some great examples (Richard Dedekind, Emmy Noether, Alexander Grothendieck) at first seem to be non-visual thinkers. They would seem to be algebra people rather than geometry people in terms of this question: Evidence for or against the claim that some students are "algebra people" and others are "geometry people" Yet each made great, explicit, deliberate contributions to geometry.

So I wonder if they are better described as visual in a different way than spatial visualization. Certainly Grothendieck made vast use of diagrams which are not really spatial diagrams (albeit they can be drawn on a blackboard). They are diagrams of conceptual relations.

Mathematics educators may know a lot more about this than I do, so I will not try to be more precise, unless people ask for that in comments.

My question is: where can I go to learn more about this distinction between different visual thinking/learning styles?