Children Can Map Precise Number Words to Approximate Arithmetic Prior to Formal Instruction.
Humans possess an intuitive number sense that can both represent and arithmetically transform visually presented collections of objects (e.g., allowing children to determine that two collections of 10 dots added together are less than 30 dots). This competency, however, is distinct from problem-solv...
| Publicado en: | Developmental Psychology Vol. 62; no. 9; pp. 1729 - 1740 |
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| Autores principales: | , |
| Formato: | Artículo |
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American Psychological Association
Sep2026
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=195791696&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 195791696 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00121649 DPS jtl: Developmental Psychology issn: 00121649 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Sep2026 vid: 62 iid: 9 pid: 34 pub: American Psychological Association artinfo: ui: 195791696 10.1037/dev0002041 ppf: 1729 ppct: 11 formats: tig: atl: Children Can Map Precise Number Words to Approximate Arithmetic Prior to Formal Instruction. aug: au: Dramkin, Denitza Odic, Darko affil: Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia su: Task performance Child development Achievement tests Cognition Pearson correlation (Statistics) Mathematics Research funding T-test (Statistics) Data analysis Descriptive statistics Statistics Concepts Learning strategies Regression analysis sug: subj: Task performance Child development Achievement tests Cognition Pearson correlation (Statistics) Mathematics Research funding T-test (Statistics) Data analysis Descriptive statistics Statistics Concepts Learning strategies Regression analysis keyword: approximate number system division estimation multiplication approximate number system division estimation multiplication ab: Humans possess an intuitive number sense that can both represent and arithmetically transform visually presented collections of objects (e.g., allowing children to determine that two collections of 10 dots added together are less than 30 dots). This competency, however, is distinct from problem-solving in school-taught mathematics, where children must determine one precise number as the correct answer. Here, we show that once children have mapped number words to their intuitive number sense, they can perform approximate arithmetic estimation: that is, they can attach precise number words to approximate division operations. Forty-five 5- to 8-year-olds completed an approximate division task in which they were given a unit of one, three, or five objects and had to then estimate between five and 110 briefly presented dots. Children provided highly accurate estimates and flexibly switched their responses according to the divisor provided. We further show that they did so without relying on various possible "cheats" and discuss three possible mechanisms for this competency. These findings highlight how the interface between number words and intuitive numerical capacities can support rich mathematical reasoning, including helping children arrive at a single approximate answer despite the inherent uncertainty of the underlying representations. Public Significance Statement: This study examines whether 5- to 8-year-old children who have not been taught how to divide in school can nevertheless intuitively do so using their number sense and knowledge of number words. We show that they can, for example, estimate that 110 dots approximately divide into "twenty-two" when told that a collection of five dots counts as "one." This informs debates around children's earliest intuitions about mathematics and adds to the theoretical debates about how these intuitions might shape learning about these same concepts formally. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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