Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-q99xh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T06:22:02.611Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Numerical intuitions in infancy: Give credit where credit is due

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 July 2017

Sophie Savelkouls
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467savelkou@bc.educordess@bc.eduhttps://www.sophiesavelkouls.com/https://www2.bc.edu/sara-cordes/lab/
Sara Cordes
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA 02467savelkou@bc.educordess@bc.eduhttps://www.sophiesavelkouls.com/https://www2.bc.edu/sara-cordes/lab/

Abstract

Leibovich et al. overlook numerous human infant studies pointing to an early emerging number sense. These studies have carefully manipulated continuous magnitudes in the context of a numerical task revealing that infants can discriminate number when extent is controlled, that infants fail to track extent cues with precision, and that infants find changes in extent less salient than numerical changes.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barth, H. C. (2008) Judgments of discrete and continuous quantities: An illusory Stroop effect. Cognition 109:251–66.Google Scholar
Brannon, E. M., Abbott, S. & Lutz, D. J. (2004) Number bias for the discrimination of large visual sets in infancy. Cognition 93(2):B5968. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2004.01.004.Google Scholar
Cantrell, L., Boyer, T. W., Cordes, S. & Smith, L. B. (2015a) Signal clarity: An account of the variability in infant quantity discrimination tasks. Developmental Science 18(6):877–93. doi: 10.1111/desc.12283.Google Scholar
Cordes, S. & Brannon, E. M. (2008) The difficulties of representing continuous extent in infancy: Using number is just easier. Child Development 79(2):476–89. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01137.x.Google Scholar
Cordes, S. & Brannon, E. M. (2009) The relative salience of discrete and continuous quantity in young infants. Developmental Science 12(3):453–63. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2008.00781.x.Google Scholar
Cordes, S. & Brannon, E. M. (2011) Attending to one of many: When infants are surprisingly poor at discriminating an item's size. Frontiers in Psychology 2:65. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00065.Google Scholar
Libertus, M. E., Starr, A. & Brannon, E. M. (2014) Number trumps area for 7-month-old infants. Developmental Psychology 50(1):108–12. doi: 10.1037/a0032986.Google Scholar
Lipton, J. S. & Spelke, E. S. (2003) Origins of number sense large-number discrimination in human infants. Psychological Science 14(5):396401. doi: 10.1111/1467-9280.01453.Google Scholar
Lipton, J. S. & Spelke, E. S. (2004) Discrimination of large and small numerosities by human infants. Infancy 5(3):271–90. doi: 10.1207/s15327078in0503_2.Google Scholar
Siegler, R. S. & Booth, J. L. (2005) Development of numerical estimation. In: Handbook of mathematical cognition, ed. Campbell, J. I. D., pp. 197212. Psychology Press, Taylor and Francis.Google Scholar
Starr, A. & Brannon, E. M. (2015) Evidence against continuous variables driving numerical discrimination in infancy. Frontiers in Psychology 6:923.Google Scholar
Xu, F. & Arriaga, R. I. (2007) Number discrimination in 10-month-old infants. British Journal of Developmental Psychology 25(1):103108. doi: 10.1348/026151005X90704.Google Scholar
Xu, F. & Spelke, E. S. (2000) Large number discrimination in 6-month-old infants. Cognition 74(1):B111. doi: 10.1016/S0010-0277(99)00066-9.Google Scholar