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The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations

Piazza et al. reported a strong correlation between education and approximate number sense (ANS) acuity in a remote Amazonian population, suggesting that symbolic and nonsymbolic numerical thinking mutually enhance one another over in mathematics instruction. But Piazza et al. ran their task using a...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Gibson, Edward, Jara-Ettinger, Julian, Levy, Roger, Piantadosi, Steven
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MIT Press 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6436536/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30931421
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/OPMI_a_00016
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author Gibson, Edward
Jara-Ettinger, Julian
Levy, Roger
Piantadosi, Steven
author_facet Gibson, Edward
Jara-Ettinger, Julian
Levy, Roger
Piantadosi, Steven
author_sort Gibson, Edward
collection PubMed
description Piazza et al. reported a strong correlation between education and approximate number sense (ANS) acuity in a remote Amazonian population, suggesting that symbolic and nonsymbolic numerical thinking mutually enhance one another over in mathematics instruction. But Piazza et al. ran their task using a computer display, which may have exaggerated the connection between the two tasks, because participants with greater education (and hence better exact numerical abilities) may have been more comfortable with the task. To explore this possibility, we ran an ANS task in a remote population using two presentation methods: (a) a computer interface and (b) physical cards, within participants. If we only analyze the effect of education on ANS as measured by the computer version of the task, we replicate Piazza et al.’s finding. But importantly, the effect of education on the card version of the task is not significant, suggesting that the use of a computer display exaggerates effects. These results highlight the importance of task considerations when working with nonindustrialized cultures, especially those with low education. Furthermore, these results raise doubts about the proposal advanced by Piazza et al. that education enhances the acuity of the approximate number sense.
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spelling pubmed-64365362019-03-29 The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations Gibson, Edward Jara-Ettinger, Julian Levy, Roger Piantadosi, Steven Open Mind (Camb) Research Articles Piazza et al. reported a strong correlation between education and approximate number sense (ANS) acuity in a remote Amazonian population, suggesting that symbolic and nonsymbolic numerical thinking mutually enhance one another over in mathematics instruction. But Piazza et al. ran their task using a computer display, which may have exaggerated the connection between the two tasks, because participants with greater education (and hence better exact numerical abilities) may have been more comfortable with the task. To explore this possibility, we ran an ANS task in a remote population using two presentation methods: (a) a computer interface and (b) physical cards, within participants. If we only analyze the effect of education on ANS as measured by the computer version of the task, we replicate Piazza et al.’s finding. But importantly, the effect of education on the card version of the task is not significant, suggesting that the use of a computer display exaggerates effects. These results highlight the importance of task considerations when working with nonindustrialized cultures, especially those with low education. Furthermore, these results raise doubts about the proposal advanced by Piazza et al. that education enhances the acuity of the approximate number sense. MIT Press 2017-12-01 /pmc/articles/PMC6436536/ /pubmed/30931421 http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/OPMI_a_00016 Text en © 2017 Massachusetts Institute of Technology http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
Gibson, Edward
Jara-Ettinger, Julian
Levy, Roger
Piantadosi, Steven
The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations
title The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations
title_full The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations
title_fullStr The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations
title_full_unstemmed The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations
title_short The Use of a Computer Display Exaggerates the Connection Between Education and Approximate Number Ability in Remote Populations
title_sort use of a computer display exaggerates the connection between education and approximate number ability in remote populations
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6436536/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30931421
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/OPMI_a_00016
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