Duke University Libraries
View Item 
  •   DukeSpace
  • Theses and Dissertations
  • Duke Dissertations
  • View Item
  •   DukeSpace
  • Theses and Dissertations
  • Duke Dissertations
  • View Item
    • Login
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

    From Magnitudes to Math: Developmental Precursors of Quantitative Reasoning

    Thumbnail
    View / Download
    3.9 Mb
    Date
    2015
    Author
    Starr, Ariel
    Repository Usage Stats
    242
    views
    130
    downloads
    Abstract

    The uniquely human mathematical mind sets us apart from all other animals. Although humans typically think about number symbolically, we also possess nonverbal representations of quantity that are present at birth and shared with many other animal species. These primitive numerical representations are thought to arise from an evolutionarily ancient system termed the Approximate Number System (ANS). The present dissertation aims to determine how these preverbal representations of quantity may serve as the foundation for more complex quantitative reasoning abilities. To this end, the five studies contained herein investigate the relations between representations of number, representations of other magnitude dimensions, and symbolic math proficiency in infants, children, and adults. The first empirical study, described in Chapter 2, investigated whether infants engage the ANS to represent the full range of natural numbers. The study presented in Chapter 3 compared infants' acuity for detecting changes in contour length to their acuity for detecting changes in number to assess whether representations of continuous quantities are primary to representations of number in infancy. The study presented in Chapter 4 compared individual differences in acuity for number, line length, and brightness in children and adults to determine how the relations between these magnitudes may change over development. Chapter 5 contains a longitudinal study investigating the relation between preverbal number sense in infancy and symbolic math abilities in preschool-aged children. Finally, the study presented in Chapter 6 investigated the mechanisms underlying the maturation of the number sense and determined which features of the number sense are predictive of symbolic math skill. Taken together, these findings confirm that number is a salient feature of the environment for infants and young children and suggest that approximate number representations are fundamental for the acquisition of symbolic math.

    Department
    Psychology and Neuroscience
    Description
    Dissertation
    Type
    Dissertation
    Subject
    Cognitive psychology
    Developmental psychology
    analog magnitudes
    approximate number system
    cognitive development
    mathematical cognition
    numerical cognition
    Permalink
    http://hdl.handle.net/10161/9842
    Collections
    • Duke Dissertations
    More Info
    Show full item record

    Creative Commons License
    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

    Rights for Collection: Duke Dissertations

     

     

    Browse

    All of DukeSpaceCommunities & CollectionsAuthorsTitlesSubjectsBy Issue DateBy Submit DateThis CollectionAuthorsTitlesSubjectsBy Issue DateBy Submit Date

    My Account

    LoginRegister

    Statistics

    View Usage Statistics