A Review of ACD-STEMM Integration
Teil 2: controlled studies of
transdisciplinary tools-for-thinking
bridges for arts-science pedagogy

Robert Root-Bernstein, Ania Pathak
and Michele Root-Bernstein

This is Part 2 of a three-part analysis of studies concerning
useful ways in which visual, plastic, musical and perform-
ing arts; crafts; and design (referred to for simplicity as arts-
crafts-design, or ACD) may be used to improve learning of
Wissenschaft, Technologie, engineering, mathematics and medicine
(STEMM) and increase professional success in these subjects.
Teil 1 outlines eight “bridges” that STEMM professionals
say they use to link ACD to their work and why they do so.
Teil 2 summarizes pedagogical studies that test the efficacy
of Bridge 1 to find out whether ACD exercise of certain “tools
for thinking” improves aspects of STEMM learning. Identi-
fied and described in Root-Bernstein and Root-Bernstein’s
Sparks of Genius (Houghton Mifflin, 1999), these cogni-
tive skills play a vital role in creative problem-raising and
problem-solving strategies shared by artists and scientists.
The thinking tools include observing, Bildgebung, abstracting,
pattern recognition, pattern-forming, analogizing, mod-
eling, dimensional thinking, empathizing or play-acting,
kinesthetic or body thinking, playing, transforming and
synthesizing.

Studies reviewed here are largely limited to those that are
well controlled, often randomized and statistically validated.
We found these studies by exploring a wide range of data-
bases using specific keywords and by following footnotes
and references from one publication to another. While only
a limited number of well-controlled studies of ACD-STEMM
pedagogical integration using “tools for thinking” turned
hoch, overall these studies demonstrate significant benefits to
teaching outcomes.

Observing. Observing can be defined as sustained atten-
tion to some phenomenon using any or all of one’s senses.
More than a dozen well-controlled studies demonstrate that
ACD-based lessons in visual and aural observing result in
improved STEMM education outcomes related to observa-
tional skills.

Imaging. Imaging refers to the ability to recall and men-
tally manipulate the look, Klang, Geruch, taste and/or feel of

Robert Root-Bernstein* (Erzieher), Department of Physiology, 567 Wilson Road,
Room 2201, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA.
Email: rootbern@msu.edu.

Ania Pathak (Forscher), Michigan State University Neuroscience Graduate Program,
Giltner Hall, 293 Farm Lane, Room 108, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI
48824, USA.; Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine, East Fee
Hall, 965 Fee Road, Room A136, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA.
Email: pathakan@msu.edu.

Michele Root-Bernstein (Erzieher), Department of Theatre, Michigan State University,
East Lansing, MI 48824, USA. Email: rootber3@msu.edu.

*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed

Supplemental files associated with this issue are available at
www.mitpressjournals.org/toc/leon/52/5.

things that are not actually present, whether those things
were once experienced or are wholly supposed. More than
a hundred well-controlled pedagogical studies demonstrate
that ACD can dramatically improve imaging ability and
STEMM learning outcomes such as test scores, class grades
and retention of learned material.

Abstracting. Abstracting, another essential STEMM
skill, involves eliminating all unnecessary information from
a set of observations to leave essential elements or mean-
ing. The few empirical studies of relevance to abstracting in
STEMM pedagogy demonstrate that it significantly improves
the learning of general principles and the transferability of
knowledge to new problems but does not improve the learn-
ing of specific facts. Whether ACD helps train students to
abstract has not been studied.

Patterning (recognizing and forming patterns). Pat-
terning involves recognition and invention of organizing
principles within a diverse set of elements. All STEMM
hypotheses and theories are explicit statements of patterns.
Trotzdem, little has been done in STEMM pedagogy to
actively address pattern recognition and pattern-forming,
and no well-controlled studies of the use of ACD to teach
these vital STEMM skills exist. It appears that patterning skill
is acquired passively, wenn überhaupt, in STEMM subjects.

Analogizing. Analogizing involves the discovery and uti-
lization of functional similarities between structurally differ-
ent things. A handful of studies suggest that the formal use of
analogies in STEMM teaching is highly effective, but no well-
controlled studies of the use of ACD analogies in STEMM
education exist. As with patterning, STEMM students seem
never to practice the generation of their own analogies.

Modeling and dimensional thinking. Modeling involves
making a simplified analog of a complex thing or process,
magnifying or miniaturizing in order to apprehend and test
properties. A related skill, dimensional thinking, involves
translating between dimensions in space and time. The only
formal study of the use of ACD-derived modeling skills to
improve STEMM learning outcomes found highly positive
results but was not well controlled. As with patterning and
analogizing, STEMM students are rarely given a chance to
invent and fabricate their own models.

Empathizing or play-acting. Empathizing (and related
play-acting) refers to the ways and means of placing oneself
in another’s “shoes,” experiencing the world from another
point of view. A handful of well-controlled studies demon-
strate that using ACD to help students “become” the things
they study significantly improves their observational ability
and analytical reasoning. More such studies are needed to
explore how generalizable the approach might be.

Kinesthetic or body thinking. Kinesthetic awareness of
body position, balance and movement, hand-eye coordina-
tion and gross motor control can be employed as a kind of
physical thinking that proves essential for experimental re-
search and invention. Body thinking and manipulative ability
often go under the radar in traditional academic assessment,
although they can correlate with practical understanding in
STEMM subjects. In der Tat, ACD practice has been demon-

494 LEONARDO, Bd. 52, NEIN. 5, S. 494– 495, 2019

https://doi.org/10.1162/leon_a_01580 ©2017 ISAST

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strated to give students an advantage in learning a wide range
of experimental and clinical procedures.

Playing. Playing involves the enjoyable, risk-free explora-
tion of physical and/or mental environments that inciden-
tally develops skills and knowledge. STEMM professionals
searching for new technical or theoretical possibilities often
use play as a creative strategy. Jedoch, except for game-
based learning (akin, but not equivalent, to strategic play),
STEMM classrooms largely eschew play.

Transforming and synthesizing. Transforming and
synthesizing integrate the entire mental “toolbox” just de-
scribed. Mental images of concepts must be transformed into
logical hypotheses expressed through diagrams and mod-
els that generate embodied experimental procedures yield-
ing observations that fall into patterns expressed in some
sensory-accessible form such as graphs or models. Only two
well-controlled studies have been carried out regarding the

use of ACD to improve these skills in STEMM classrooms.
Both demonstrated improved learning, retention and trans-
fer of knowledge to new problems. More study is required.
In sum, well-controlled studies of the pedagogical use of
the various thinking tools are far more extensive for some
Werkzeuge (observing, Bildgebung, modeling) than for others (ab-
stracting, Musterung, analogizing, body thinking, playing,
transforming-synthesizing). Where there is good data, it in-
variably confirms the self-reports of STEMM professionals
summarized in Part 1 of this study: Tools for thinking can
provide valuable bridges between ACD and STEMM learn-
ing and practice.

A similar analysis of the remaining seven bridges that con-
nect STEMM professionals to ACD is provided in Part 3 von
this extended abstract.

Manuscript received 31 Marsch 2016.

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