Early development of spatial-numerical associations: consistency and variability of the SNARC effect in kindergarten children.

RAMOS, Tania; GEORGES, Carrie; SCHILTZ, Christine

doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2025.106393

Article (Scientific journals)

Early development of spatial-numerical associations: consistency and variability of the SNARC effect in kindergarten children.

RAMOS, Tania; GEORGES, Carrie; SCHILTZ, Christine

2026 • In Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 262, p. 106393

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

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https://hdl.handle.net/10993/68066

DOI
10.1016/j.jecp.2025.106393

PubMed
41100965

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Keywords :

Development; Individual SNARC Consistency; Kindergarten; Magnitude Judgment; Number-Space Associations; SNARC effect; Humans; Male; Female; Child, Preschool; Judgment; Child; Mathematics; Space Perception/physiology; Child Development/physiology; Mathematical Concepts; Child Development; Space Perception; Experimental and Cognitive Psychology; Developmental and Educational Psychology

Abstract :

[en] Numbers and space are associated in the human brain. One of the most-studied spatial-numerical associations (SNAs) is the SNARC effect (Spatial Numerical Association of Response Codes), for which robust group-level effects are reported across adult studies. Despite well-replicated group-level effects, recent individual-level analysis in adults indicate that only a minority of individuals consistently map numbers onto space (Cipora et al., 2019). To date, SNARC studies in children remain generally scarce with inconclusive results. And none have explored the consistency of individual effects at earlier developmental stages. In the present study, we therefore tested 135 kindergarten children performing magnitude judgments to assess not only group-level SNARC effects but also the prevalence of individual consistency using the same methodology recently applied in adults (Cipora et al., 2019). Our findings reveal a significant magnitude SNARC effect at the group-level. However, similarly to adults, only 37% of the children consistently associated numbers with space in a left-to-right direction when considering CIs around observed effects. While these findings suggest that SNAs on average emerge earlier in life, they also point towards considerable heterogeneity across individuals in that respect. How this can help us understand the conflicting results in the literature regarding significant group-level SNARC effects in children, and guide future research on the potential relation between individual SNARC effects and educational measures in math will be discussed.

Disciplines :

Theoretical & cognitive psychology

Author, co-author :

RAMOS, Tania ; University of Luxembourg > Faculty of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences > Department of Behavioural and Cognitive Sciences > Team Christine SCHILTZ

GEORGES, Carrie ; University of Luxembourg > Faculty of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences (FHSE) > Department of Behavioural and Cognitive Sciences (DBCS) > Cognitive Science and Assessment

SCHILTZ, Christine ; University of Luxembourg > Faculty of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences (FHSE) > Department of Behavioural and Cognitive Sciences (DBCS) > Cognitive Science and Assessment

External co-authors :

Language :

English

Title :

Early development of spatial-numerical associations: consistency and variability of the SNARC effect in kindergarten children.

Publication date :

February 2026

Journal title :

Journal of Experimental Child Psychology

ISSN :

0022-0965

eISSN :

1096-0457

Publisher :

Academic Press Inc., United States

Volume :

262

Pages :

106393

Peer reviewed :

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

Additional URL :

https://api.elsevier.com/content/article/PII:S0022096525002000?httpAccept=text/xml

Funders :

National Research Fund
National Research Fund

Funding text :

We thank the reviewers for their valuable feedback, which has substantially contributed to the quality of this manuscript. We also extend our gratitude to Nicolas Masson for his insightful comments on the methodological aspects of the study. This work was supported by the Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) [INTER/ FWO / 20/14716314 \u2013 SpaNuMaDev]. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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