Psychological Development and Education ›› 2024, Vol. 40 ›› Issue (6): 761-773.doi: 10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2024.06.01

   

Individual Differences of Numerical Acuity and Its Impact on the Performance Patterns and Strategy Use among Preschool Children

LIANG Yuan1,2, ZHANG Lijin2,3,4, JI Ting1, LI Boyi1, BU Fan1   

  1. 1. Key Laboratory of Artificial Intelligence and Language Cognitive Neuroscience, Xi'an International Studies University, Xi'an 710128;
    2. School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an 710062;
    3. Shaanxi Key Research Center of Child Mental and Behavioral Health, Xi'an 710062;
    4. Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Behavior and Cognitive Neuroscience, Xi'an 710062
  • Published:2024-11-13

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Abstract: This study investigated the effect of numerical acuity levels on the performance and estimation patterns in non-symbolic and symbolic number line estimation (NLE) tasks among 4- and 5-year-old children. One hundred and fifty two 4-year-old children and 102 5-year-old children completed two types of SFON task (one is imitation SFON, and the other is automatic SFON) and three types of NLE tasks (non-symbolic area, number-to-position (NP), and position-to-number (PN)). We found three important results: Firstly, latent profile analysis showed that the levels of numerical acuity were classified as high, average, and poor for 4-year-old children, and that were classified as top and average for children aged 5 years. Children's perceptual acuity in capturing numerical information increased significantly from 4 to 5 years old, experiencing a process from relying on reference cue to independent and spontaneous acquisition. Secondly, there existed a context effect on the performance of NLE for 4- and 5-year-old children. All children performed better on non-symbolic area NLE task than that on symbolic NP and PN NLE tasks. Thirdly, the numerical acuity affected performance patterns and strategy use of NLE. Most 5-year-olds can choose appropriate estimation strategies on either non-symbolic NLE or symbolic NLE tasks flexibly. These findings confirm the hypothesis of four-step developmental model, uncover the internal mechanism of children’s mental numerical representation, and provide a theoretical reference for identifying, predicting and screening preschool children with risk of low numerical acuity.

Key words: preschool children, numerical acuity, number line estimation, estimation patterns

CLC Number: 

  • B844
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