LEARN Newsletter - Editioun 2021

Book published by LEARN (2021)

Long-term Relevance and Interrelation of Symbolic and Non-symbolic Abilities in Mathematical-numerical Development: Evidence from Large-scale Assessment Data

in Cognitive Development (2021), 58

Switching language while solving math problems: Relation between language and math achievement on a bilingual math test

Scientific Conference (2020, June)

The right hemispheric dominance for faces in preschoolers depends on the visual discrimination level.

in Developmental Science (2020), 23(3),

The developmental origin of human adults’ right hemispheric dominance in response to face stimuli remains unclear, in particular because young infants’ right hemispheric advantage in face-selective ... [more ▼]

The developmental origin of human adults’ right hemispheric dominance in response to face stimuli remains unclear, in particular because young infants’ right hemispheric advantage in face-selective response is no longer present in preschool children, before written language acquisition. Here we used fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS) with scalp electroencephalography (EEG) to test 52 preschool children (5.5 years old) at two different levels of face discrimination: discrimination of faces against objects, measuring face-selectivity, or discrimination between individual faces. While the contrast between faces and nonface objects elicits strictly bilateral occipital responses in children, strengthening previous observations, discrimination of individual faces in the same children reveals a strong right hemispheric lateralization over the occipitotemporal cortex. Picture-plane inversion of the face stimuli significantly decreases the individual discrimination response, although to a much smaller extent than in older children and adults tested with the same paradigm. However, there is only a nonsignificant trend for a decrease in right hemispheric lateralization with inversion. There is no relationship between the right hemispheric lateralization in individual face discrimination and preschool levels of readings abilities. The observed difference in the right hemispheric lateralization obtained in the same population of children with two different paradigms measuring neural responses to faces indicates that the level of visual discrimination is a key factor to consider when making inferences about the development of hemispheric lateralization of face perception in the human brain. [less ▲]

When one-two-three beats two-one-three: Tracking the acquisition of the verbal number sequence.

in Psychonomic Bulletin and Review (2020), 27(1), 122-129

Learning how to count is a crucial step in cognitive development, which progressively allows for more elaborate numerical processing. The existing body of research consistently reports how children ... [more ▼]

Learning how to count is a crucial step in cognitive development, which progressively allows for more elaborate numerical processing. The existing body of research consistently reports how children associate the verbal code with exact quantity. However, the early acquisition of this code, when the verbal numbers are encoded in long-term memory as a sequence of words, has rarely been examined. Using an incidental assessment method based on serial recall of number words presented in ordered versus non-ordered sequences (e.g., one-two-three vs. two-one-three), we tracked the progressive acquisition of the verbal number sequence in children aged 3-6 years. Results revealed evidence for verbal number sequence knowledge in the youngest children even before counting is fully mastered. Verbal numerical knowledge thus starts to be organized as a sequence in long-term memory already at the age of 3 years, and this numerical sequence knowledge is assessed in a sensitive manner by incidental rather than explicit measures of number knowledge. [less ▲]

The neural signature of numerosity by separating numerical and continuous magnitude extraction in visual cortex with frequency-tagged EEG.

in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (2020), 117(11), 5726-5732

The ability to handle approximate quantities, or number sense, has been recurrently linked to mathematical skills, although the nature of the mechanism allowing to extract numerical information (i.e ... [more ▼]

The ability to handle approximate quantities, or number sense, has been recurrently linked to mathematical skills, although the nature of the mechanism allowing to extract numerical information (i.e., numerosity) from environmental stimuli is still debated. A set of objects is indeed not only characterized by its numerosity but also by other features, such as the summed area occupied by the elements, which often covary with numerosity. These intrinsic relations between numerosity and nonnumerical magnitudes led some authors to argue that numerosity is not independently processed but extracted through a weighting of continuous magnitudes. This view cannot be properly tested through classic behavioral and neuroimaging approaches due to these intrinsic correlations. The current study used a frequency-tagging EEG approach to separately measure responses to numerosity as well as to continuous magnitudes. We recorded occipital responses to numerosity, total area, and convex hull changes but not to density and dot size. We additionally applied a model predicting primary visual cortex responses to the set of stimuli. The model output was closely aligned with our electrophysiological data, since it predicted discrimination only for numerosity, total area, and convex hull. Our findings thus demonstrate that numerosity can be independently processed at an early stage in the visual cortex, even when completely isolated from other magnitude changes. The similar implicit discrimination for numerosity as for some continuous magnitudes, which correspond to basic visual percepts, shows that both can be extracted independently, hence substantiating the nature of numerosity as a primary feature of the visual scene. [less ▲]

Units-first or tens-first: Does language matter when processing visually presented two-digit numbers?

in Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology (2020), 73(5), 726-738

The linguistic structure of number words can influence performance in basic numerical tasks such as mental calculation, magnitude comparison, and transcoding. Especially the presence of ten-unit inversion ... [more ▼]

The linguistic structure of number words can influence performance in basic numerical tasks such as mental calculation, magnitude comparison, and transcoding. Especially the presence of ten-unit inversion in number words seems to affect number processing. Thus, at the beginning of formal math education, young children speaking inverted languages tend to make relatively more errors in transcoding. However, it remains unknown whether and how inversion affects transcoding in older children and adults. Here we addressed this question by assessing two-digit number transcoding in adults and fourth graders speaking French and German, that is, using non-inverted and inverted number words, respectively. We developed a novel transcoding paradigm during which participants listened to two-digit numbers and identified the heard number among four Arabic numbers. Critically, the order of appearance of units and tens in Arabic numbers was manipulated mimicking the "units-first" and "tens-first" order of German and French. In a third "simultaneous" condition, tens and units appeared at the same time in an ecological manner. Although language did not affect overall transcoding speed in adults, we observed that German-speaking fourth graders were globally slower than their French-speaking peers, including in the "simultaneous" condition. Moreover, French-speaking children were faster in transcoding when the order of digit appearance was congruent with their number-word system (i.e., "tens-first" condition) while German-speaking children appeared to be similarly fast in the "units-first" and "tens-first" conditions. These findings indicate that inverted languages still impose a cognitive cost on number transcoding in fourth graders, which seems to disappear by adulthood. They underline the importance of language in numerical cognition and suggest that language should be taken into account during mathematics education. [less ▲]

Developmental changes in neural letter-selectivity: A 1-year follow-up of beginning readers.

in Developmental science (2020)

The developmental course of neural tuning to visual letter strings is unclear. Here we tested 39 children longitudinally, at the beginning of grade 1 (6.45 ± 0.33 years old) and 1 year after, with fast ... [more ▼]

The developmental course of neural tuning to visual letter strings is unclear. Here we tested 39 children longitudinally, at the beginning of grade 1 (6.45 ± 0.33 years old) and 1 year after, with fast periodic visual stimulation in electroencephalography to assess the evolution of selective neural responses to letter strings and their relationship with emerging reading abilities. At both grades, frequency-tagged letter strings were discriminated from pseudofont strings (i.e. letter-selectivity) over the left occipito-temporal cortex, with effects observed at the individual level in 62% of children. However, visual words were not discriminated from pseudowords (lexical access) at either grade. Following 1 year of schooling, letter-selective responses showed a specific increase in amplitude, a more complex pattern of harmonics, and were located more anteriorly over the left occipito-temporal cortex. Remarkably, at both grades, neural responses were highly significant at the individual level and correlated with individual reading scores. The amplitude increase in letter-selective responses between grades was not found for discrimination responses of familiar keyboard symbols from pseudosymbols, and was not related to a general increase in visual stimulation responses. These findings demonstrate a rapid onset of left hemispheric letter selectivity, with 1 year of reading instruction resulting in increased emerging reading abilities and a clear quantitative and qualitative evolution within left hemispheric neural circuits for reading. [less ▲]

The effect of grade retention on reading skills of immigrant children in multilingual elementary school. A longitudinal study.

Presentation (2019, November 06)

In a longitudinal study the effect of grade retention on reading skills of immigrant children in multilingual elementary school was investigated. The study was conducted between 2013 and 2017 and thirty ... [more ▼]

In a longitudinal study the effect of grade retention on reading skills of immigrant children in multilingual elementary school was investigated. The study was conducted between 2013 and 2017 and thirty-four per cent of the sample was lost due to grade retention. These children had been followed from kindergarten to grade 3 of elementary school. To observe differences among promoted and retained students, we assessed them using various language and socioeconomic measures. We also compared a subgroup of promoted students, scoring lower in grade 2 than the mean of retained students in reading comprehension. The current study revealed four main findings. Firstly, there were no significant differences between promoted and retained students in their first language vocabulary (Portuguese). Secondly, there was a significant difference in second and third language vocabularies (Luxembourgish and German) and in German reading tasks (the language of instruction) from kindergarten to grade 2, with promoted students scoring higher than retained students. Thirdly, and most importantly, retained students did not catch up with promoted students in the language of instruction (German) measures even after grade retention, but they did in language of socialisation (Luxembourgish). Fourthly, and in contrast to retained students, the low-achieving promoted students improved significantly in German reading comprehension by grade 3.The last two findings underline that grade retention does not lead to improvement in children’s reading comprehension. As vocabulary is one of the main predictors of reading comprehension, programs that improve poor readers’ vocabulary knowledge may be more efficient than grade retention. The present findings corroborate previous studies reporting that grade retention is not beneficial and that low-achieving students promoted to the next grade show better academic outcomes later than retained students. [less ▲]

Impact of teaching methods for reading on neural tuning to words in young poor readers

Poster (2019, September)

The impact of teaching methods on the left hemispheric (LH) specialization for reading in children remains unknown. We tested 42 first graders (mean age: 6.08 years) from schools using both a phonic and a ... [more ▼]

The impact of teaching methods on the left hemispheric (LH) specialization for reading in children remains unknown. We tested 42 first graders (mean age: 6.08 years) from schools using both a phonic and a global method in parallel, behaviorally and with Fast Periodic Visual Stimulation using electroencephalography. 40-sec strings of pseudofonts were displayed at 6Hz, in which were periodically displayed (1.2Hz) either words taught at school with whole-word form rote-learning (global method) or control pseudowords eliciting grapheme-phoneme mappings (phonic method). Control pseudowords elicited LH responses whatever the reading ability. For global words, a difference emerged as a function of group: in good and average readers, responses were stronger in the LH, while in poor readers, global words elicited an atypical bilateral neural pattern due to reduced response amplitude in the LH. These results suggest that difficulties in automatizing GP mappings induce reliance on an alternative visual strategy when available. [less ▲]