"The Writing Problems of Visual Thinkers"

by Gerald Grow

School of Journalism, Media & Graphic Arts

Florida A&M University, Tallahassee FL 32307 USA

Available: http://www.longleaf.net/ggrow

IV. Discussion

Shaughnessy and "Basic Writers"

All of the problems identified by this approach sound like the familiar problems of "basic writers." What difference, then, does the present theory make? -- It leads us to a major conclusion that could have widespread consequences: Clashes between nonverbal and verbal thinking could be a hidden factor in the writing problems of many students, even though those problems have previously been analyzed as having other causes. In her widely respected analysis of writing errors, Shaughnessy (1977) cites many of examples that, from our perspective, sound very much like the byproducts of visual thinking. "For reasons that are not always clear, or the same, writers at this basic level often fail to name the object or person or idea they are writing about This evasion of the subject entangles the writer in passive constructions or inverted patterns-it is, there is, etc Subjects tend to be vaguely named: a method of teaching is labeled this idea, controversial issues are called certain things, or independent study is referred to as this way But the favorite word is thing, the all-purpose noun that parallels the all-purpose that of syntax or the all-purpose comma of punctuation. No noun comes so easily or covers such a range of "things." (199; her italics) What are such writers thinking when writing "thing"? --Probably, they are thinking "thing" with the visual or kinesthetic imagination. Such writing problems might be attributed to "oral" thinking as well, but other errors seem too inward for orality. In another place, Shaughnessy describes a problematic passage as having "the quality of a writer's inner, pre-verbalized thought, not yet shaped for communication" (232). Notice that in using "thought" and "communication," she presumes that the communiction will be in words; I have argued that some thoughts may already be shaped for communication, but in a nonverbal medium, and it is their use in a verbal medium that causes difficulty. A number of the errors Shaughnessy attributes to "basic writers" could easily have their roots in visual thinking and other nonverbal modalities of thought.

Orality, Literacy, and Visual Thinking

This paper has implications for a second approach to the teaching of writing--the orality-to-literacy model. Some of the central characteristics attributed to "orality" appear in the student writings quoted in this paper, where they are explained rather as characteristics of visual thinking. "Preliterate" thinking may thus not be as intensively oral (sound-derived) as Ong and others insist. Visual, synesthetic, and other forms of non-verbal thought may well account for some of the features currently attributed to preliterate orality. Furthermore, visual thinking can continue in force after the acquisition of full literacy as a parallel mode of mind and may not be assimilated by literacy--as orality is thought to be. The orality-to-literacy model envisions verbal thought replacing other modes as one matures. This paper envisions mature thought as an interpenetration of several different highly developed modes of thought. Visual thinkers, as described in this paper, have several tendencies opposed to those Ong and his followers attribute to oral thinkers. Because words are secondary to their thinking, the language of visual thinkers may be more private and eccentric than the communal language of orality. Because their primary thought processes are non-sequential, I have proposed that visual thinkers have difficulty with the dominant mode of oral thinkers: narration. And, throughout his analysis, Ong (after McLuhan, I believe) considers the visual to be severely analytical; this paper assumes a more holistic concept of visual thinking (a view also held by many others writing about visual thinking, such as Franck, 1973; Jackson, 1975; McKim, 1972). This paper differs in another respect from the orality-to-literacy model. Visual thinkers are not necessarily orally competent; some speak poorly and only when required to. Even in a primary oral culture, there must have been inarticulate people. I have argued that it is important to consider visual thinking as a modality separate from orality. In addition, anyone tempted to adapt the orality-to-literacy transition to visual thinkers should read Brandt (1990) for her critique of the orality approach.

Implications for Research

The theory offered in this paper is a first step toward improving the teaching of writing to visual thinkers-and perhaps to musical, kinesthetic, personal, and interpersonal thinkers as well-to use Gardner's (1985) categories. The concept in this paper directs us to improve writing by first identifying the underlying thought processes, rather than assuming verbal thought and working to improve the mechanics of grammar and syntax. How to teach visual thinkers to write better remains to be determined, though recent research on the teaching of reading and thinking suggest places to begin. In particular, the following seem to me to open important doors: Dixon's remarkable book, The Spatial Child; Silverman's (1989) account of the visual-spatial learner; John-Steiner's (1987) study of creative thinking in several modalities, including visual; Clarke's (1990) innovative approach to teaching thinking through graphic symbols; Sinatra's (1986) writing exercises based on an understanding of visual literacy Note 11; Gardner's (1985) description of multiple intelligences; the revolutionary work by Lakoff (1988) and Johnson (1987) grounding linguistic thinking in metaphors developed from bodily experience, which challenges the fundamental principle of modern lingustics and deconstruction--that signs and semiotic systems are arbitrary--and legitimizes nonverbal activities in the teaching of writing; recent advances in the teaching of reading, such as instruction in cognitive processes and learning strategies (Derry, 1988/9; Derry, 1990; Jones & Idol, 1990; Jones, 1986); research on the visual representation of ideas (Jones, 1988/9; Armbruster & Anderson, 1984; commercial seminars by Information Mapping, Inc.); the importance of schemata in text and in readers' understanding (Anderson, 1984); and metacognitive cues which signal readers on how to interpret and organize what is being written (Vande Kopple, 1985). Studies of the interrelation among different modes of thought -- what Stacks and Andersen (1989) called "intra­p;personal communication" -- may also provide valuable resources for writing improvement, especially if this helps maintain the integrity of nonverbal experience in the face of literacy's power. Non-verbal thinkers may be more emotionally and kinesthetically oriented than verbal thinkers; for them, drama may provide a fruitful link between experience and exposition. Innovative work in progress by Karen Klein and Linda Hecker (first developed for dyslexic students) uses kinesthetic walking-through exercises to help writers organize their stories at the bodily level before outlining them in writing. Research is needed on how to integrate students with strong visual abilities but weak writing abilities into the college curriculum. Stories from the adult literacy movement show that some individuals can attain high positions without being able to read or write; perhaps some students with visual gifts should be forgiven the requirement of learning to write "college prose." Special integrative programs may be required which pool students with complementary skills the way those skills are combined on the job--the way editors and art directors work together on publications. A study could be made of visual thinkers who write well. How have they bridged the gap between visualizing and writing? Do they visualize and then transform the visual images into prose? Do they use frequent illustrations? How do they sequence their visualizations into prose? If they have faced and overcome the difficulties this paper posits, they may have valuable ideas for helping other visual thinkers write better. Research on visual thinkers is hampered by the lack of a simple, reliable test for identifying them. Silverman, Dixon, and Truch identify visual thinkers by analyzing the relations among subtests from the Wechsler IQ battery; but the visual portions of some IQ tests seem to me to prove only that their makers lacked the imagination to see the multiple possibilities inherent in all images. I once thought that a spatial rotations test would suffice (Wheatley, 1978), but while it seems to identify analytical visual thinkers (such as mathematicians and architects), aesthetically oriented visual thinkers do not necessarily do well on it. To label someone a visual thinker still requires a judgment call. Yet the label is meaningful to teachers of fine arts, graphic arts, graphic design, architecture, interior design, publication design, and other forms of visual communication.

Varieties of Visual Thinking

In this study, visual thinking has been limited mainly to "static imagery," a limitation not acceptable in more advanced studies of "spatial ability." There are other types of visual thinking. The analysis presented here and the students studied probably should be considered in terms of "spatial thinking" (Brown & Wheatley, 1990), in contrast to "visual thinking" (such as generating and transforming mental images) or "pattern recognition" (seeing similarities in complex forms). There may be several distinct forms of visual thinking that have distinctly different effects on the dynamics of writing.

Varieties of Writing

The "writing" considered in this paper refers to the kind most college teachers would consider desirable (Olson, 1977a): writing to prove that you have learned. But perhaps such highly organized, logically-sequenced, fully-explicit expository prose should be looked upon as an unusual and highly specialized form of human expression. Certainly, stories are more universal than research papers, and disorganized, illogical writing is more common than logical, organized writing. Illustrated writing may be more "natural" than writing in words alone. Perhaps visual thinkers need to learn not to "write" (in Olson's sense of "text" -- logical, fully-elaborated, expository sequences made exclusively of words), but to "communicate" through mixed media. The dominant concept of writing -- based on the typographically traditional book format -- has been severely challenged by easy interplay between graphics and text that can be found in any well-designed magazine. Fortunately, typography has recently been rescued from the near-invisibility imposed on it by the typewriter. In page-layout software, text can be divided into segments that can be typographically differentiated and arranged into sidebars, boxes, tables, pull-quotes, and the like, creating what Bolter called "topographical" prose that is at once verbal and visual. The user of hypertext can go even further and organize prose in a multidimensional non-linear structure (for good discussions, see Tuman, 1992, and Bolter, 1991). (Hello, we are in a form of hypertext now!) Perhaps writing has been made unnecessarily difficult by the rarely challenged assumption that students should write in a one-dimensional sequence and produce a document composed exclusively of words typed in a uniform typeface. Visual thinkers might learn to write better if they abandoned the words-only typewriter format and composed their thoughts directly onto page-layout programs in which the visual presentation of the material is, from the beginning, an essential part of its meaning. Note 12 Visual thinkers may be best at communicating complex ideas in forms where words are used to refine and label images, rather than images used to decorate pages of text. On the other hand (those "other hands" give this topic a spider-like fascination) Cartoon 1 (gif file, 15K) so many aspects of good writing seem to arise when words are forced to substitute for all other forms of communication (such as gesture, tone of voice, and pictures) that, to develop the right mental muscles, good writers may have to wrestle naked with the naked word. The strength of this engagement could be diluted, not helped, by graphics and layout. Learning to write better might even be influenced (as Halio, 1990, suggested) by whether one uses a computer with a graphic interface (such as a Macintosh or Windows) or a computer with a verbal interface (such as MSDOS). (1996 note: Does anyone still use a non-graphic interface? Are we on the verge of point-and-click writing?)

Verbal Bias of Schooling

This paper arose from a concern with the fate of students who have a gift for visual thinking. The context for this concern is the existing educational system with its bias toward verbal performance and the kind of thinking that results in analytical, expository prose. Some of the writing problems of visual thinkers are almost certainly a byproduct of this narrow educational emphasis. It is like requiring everyone, regardless of body type, to lift 150-lb. weights in order to graduate. Unfortunately, even the literate bias of schooling (to use Olson's phrase, 1977b) does not necessarily produce good writers, and there is reason to be concerned that many of our future students, visual thinkers or not, will write as poorly as the students cited in this paper. Some students appear to be pre-literate not due to any special gift, but due to the influence of television and the lack of effective education. Others, impelled by an inner talent for visual thinking, approach writing from a perspective that causes them special problems. And if proponents of visual literacy like Sinatra are correct, visual thinkers will not respond to the kind of writing drill that helps underdeveloped verbal thinkers. Both groups, however, will benefit from learning the importance, specific skills, and hard work of communicating, in whatever modality.

Verbal Thought Reconsidered

It is common these days to read that verbal thought is linear, sequential, slow, located in the left hemisphere, and fundamentally incompatible with spatial thought. Note 13 There are other possibilities. The increasing use of subliminal audio tapes suggests that the mind may have the ability to think in complete syntactical units at enormous rates of speed, and in several channels simultaneously. One recent experiment suggests that the mind may be able to think a burst of a thousand words as rapidly as it can produce a picture: Korba (1986) estimated that people can think at the equivalent of 4,000 words per minute. It is my hunch that people engage in high-speed, multi-channeled fully-verbalized thinking, as well as simultaneous "multitasking" in cryptic forms of verbal thought, nonverbal modalities, and integrated forms of thought. Such a concept challenges current ideas about the limitations of "linear" thought and could revolutionize our idea of where writing starts. Current models tend to set visual and verbal thinking against one another, but there may well be a mode in which visual and verbal thinking are deeply intertwined. Such a concept could revive interest in ideas that rarely appear in current research agendas -- such as intuition and the creative unconscious.

Limitations of the Study

There are problems with terminology in this field--and in this paper. More tentatively than it may sound, I have advanced the idea that visual thinking causes certain kinds of writing problems. But the three problems I have discussed--lack of words, problems of sequencing, and difficulty communicating context--may be separable mental conditions that are not necessarily linked to visual thinking. Furthermore, many visual thinkers clearly do not have these problems; and people may have these writing problems without being visual thinkers. Note 14 I have used the term "visual thinking" to stand for something that has yet to be defined with care, making a broad sketch of a field in which few details are clear. It is almost certain that the kind of mental states I attribute to visual thinking occur in other kinds of thinking as well, and those may contribute to writing problems in a manner similar to what I have argued for here. The literature on mysticism, for instance, describes unitary states that are wordless, imageless, utterly holistic, and so contextless as to be given names like "cosmic consciousness." Joel Goldsmith (1959) describes such a state this way: "All that exists in this universe is God 'is-ing'--Is, Is, Is" (185-6) (Note the verb!) Words, analysis, labels, sequence, syntax, context, connectives, and images all vanish to make room for a state of consciousness that is valuable for certain purposes (Goldsmith is a spiritual healer) Note 15 but cannot be written, spoken, or even visualized. Further knowledge about such states may, by contrast, help identify the actual states of mind at work when visual thinkers have writing problems. Note 16

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