TY - JOUR A1 - Sixtus, Elena A1 - Lonnemann, Jan A1 - Fischer, Martin H. A1 - Werner, Karsten T1 - Mental Number Representations in 2D Space JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - There is evidence both for mental number representations along a horizontal mental number line with larger numbers to the right of smaller numbers (for Western cultures) and a physically grounded, vertical representation where “more is up.” Few studies have compared effects in the horizontal and vertical dimension and none so far have combined both dimensions within a single paradigm where numerical magnitude was task-irrelevant and none of the dimensions was primed by a response dimension. We now investigated number representations over both dimensions, building on findings that mental representations of numbers and space co-activate each other. In a Go/No-go experiment, participants were auditorily primed with a relatively small or large number and then visually presented with quasi-randomly distributed distractor symbols and one Arabic target number (in Go trials only). Participants pressed a central button whenever they detected the target number and elsewise refrained from responding. Responses were not more efficient when small numbers were presented to the left and large numbers to the right. However, results indicated that large numbers were associated with upper space more strongly than small numbers. This suggests that in two-dimensional space when no response dimension is given, numbers are conceptually associated with vertical, but not horizontal space. KW - spatial-numerical associations KW - SNARC KW - vertical space KW - horizontal space KW - Go/No-go task Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00172 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 10 PB - Frontiers Research Foundation CY - Lausanne ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Ehm, Jan-Henning A1 - Lonnemann, Jan A1 - Brandenburg, Janin A1 - Huschka, Sina Simone A1 - Hasselhorn, Marcus A1 - Lervag, Arne T1 - Exploring factors underlying children’s acquisition and retrieval of sound sound-symbol association skills JF - Journal of experimental child psychology N2 - Letter knowledge is considered an important cognitive foundation for learning to read. The underlying mechanisms of the association between letter knowledge and reading skills are, however, not fully understood. Acquiring letter knowledge depends on the ability to learn and retrieve sound–symbol pairings. In the current study, this process was explored by setting preschool children’s (N = 242, mean age = 5.57 years) performance in the acquisition and retrieval of a paired associate learning (PAL) task in relation to their letter knowledge as well as to their performance in tasks assessing precursors of reading skills (i.e., phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, phonological short-term memory, backward recall, and response inhibition). Multiple regression analyses revealed that performance in the acquisition of the PAL task was significantly associated with phonological awareness and backward recall, whereas performance in the retrieval of the PAL task was significantly associated with rapid automatized naming, phonological awareness, and backward recall. Moreover, PAL proved to be mediating the relation between reading precursors and letter knowledge. Together, these findings indicate that the acquisition of letter knowledge may depend on a visual–verbal associative learning mechanism and that different factors contribute to the acquisition and retrieval of such visual–verbal associations. KW - Visual-verbal associative learning KW - Phonological awareness KW - Letter knowledge KW - Rapid automatized naming KW - Working memory KW - Reading Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2018.07.006 SN - 0022-0965 SN - 1096-0457 VL - 177 SP - 86 EP - 99 PB - Elsevier CY - New York ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Lonnemann, Jan A1 - Li, Su A1 - Zhao, Pei A1 - Linkersdörfer, Janosch A1 - Lindberg, Sven A1 - Hasselhorn, Marcus T1 - Differences in Counting Skills Between Chinese and German Children Are Accompanied by Differences in Processing of Approximate Numerical Magnitude Information JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - Human beings are supposed to possess an approximate number system (ANS) dedicated to extracting and representing approximate numerical magnitude information as well as an object tracking system (OTS) for the rapid and accurate enumeration of small sets. It is assumed that the OTS and the ANS independently contribute to the acquisition of more elaborate numerical concepts. Chinese children have been shown to exhibit more elaborate numerical concepts than their non-Chinese peers, but it is still an open question whether similar cross-national differences exist with regard to the underlying systems, namely the ANS and the OTS. In the present study, we investigated this question by comparing Chinese and German preschool children with regard to their performance in a non-symbolic numerical magnitude comparison task (assessing the ANS) and in an enumeration task (assessing the OTS). In addition, we compared children’s counting skills. To ensure that possible between-group differences could not be explained by differences in more general performance factors, we also assessed children’s reasoning ability and processing speed. Chinese children showed a better counting performance and a more accurate performance in the non-symbolic numerical magnitude comparison task. These differences in performance could not be ascribed to differences in reasoning abilities and processing speed. In contrast, Chinese and German children did not differ significantly in the enumeration of small sets. The superior counting performance of Chinese children was thus found to be reflected in the ANS but not in the OTS. KW - approximate number system KW - subitizing KW - counting KW - cross-national comparison KW - preschool Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02656 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 9 PB - Frontiers Research Foundation CY - Lausanne ER -