Author:

Keywords:

Social Sciences, Psychology, Multidisciplinary, Psychology, magnitude representation, magnitude comparison, enumeration, subitizing, arithmetic achievement, INDIVIDUAL-DIFFERENCES, NUMBER WORDS, PERFORMANCE, ACUITY, SKILLS, BRAIN, MATHEMATICS ACHIEVEMENT, NUMEROSITIES, DYSCALCULIA, C16/16/001#53766053, 1303 Specialist Studies in Education, 1701 Psychology, 3904 Specialist studies in education, 5201 Applied and developmental psychology

Abstract:

The numerical and arithmetic skills are critical predictors of academic success. In current studies, it has been questioned what numerical skills relate with arithmetic achievement, whether the non-symbolic numerical magnitudes processing or the symbolic magnitudes processing. In the current study a sample of 104 preschool children was taken. They completed a non-symbolic numerical comparison task, a symbolic numerical comparison task and a dot enumeration task, as well as a standardized arithmetic performance test (TEMA-3). Moreover, general cognitive skills such as intelligence, processing speed, inhibitory control, memory span and visuo-spatial memory, were controlled. To test whether the variables of number processing predict in the absence of the above predictors, it was conducted a hierarchical regression analysis, taking the TEMA-3 as a dependent variable and introducing the other predictors and the numerical processing tasks in next steps. The model explained 65.5% of the variance. But only the symbolic magnitudes comparison and the enumeration contributed to the arithmetic achievement variance in absence of the control variables, while the non-symbolic magnitudes comparison did not contribute significantly. These results suggest that a good knowledge of symbolic numbers is important to the children's mathematical development, being particularly crucial the access to the magnitude from symbolic numbers more than the magnitude representation per se.