Spatial representation of magnitude in gorillas and orangutans

Gazes, Regina Paxton; Diamond, Rachel F. L.; Hope, Jasmine M.; Caillaud, Damien; Stoinski, Tara S.; Hampton, Robert R.

doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2017.07.010

Cited by 41 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…Nevertheless, these biases could depend on continuous extents, which were not systematically controlled. A spatial representation of magnitude has been recently also found in gorillas and orangutans (Gazes, Diamond, Hope, Caillaud, Stoinski, & Hampton, ). Interestingly, however, even if present in most of the individuals the direction of the association was either left‐to‐right or right‐to‐left oriented.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 79%

“…Interestingly, however, even if present in most of the individuals the direction of the association was either left‐to‐right or right‐to‐left oriented. Differences in orientation do not appear to be due to species or handedness, but rather to idiosyncratic experiences such as the interactions with caregivers (Gazes et al ., ). Different evidence came from a study in cleaner fish: a lack of association between magnitudes and space was observed in this species that can be attributed to either experiential or evolutionary factors (Triki & Bshary, ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

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A mental number line in human newborns

Giorgio

Lunghi

Rugani

et al. 2019

Developmental Science

120

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Humans represent numbers on a mental number line with smaller numbers on the left and larger numbers on the right side. A left‐to‐right oriented spatial–numerical association, (SNA), has been demonstrated in animals and infants. However, the possibility that SNA is learnt by early exposure to caregivers’ directional biases is still open. We conducted two experiments: in Experiment 1, we tested whether SNA is present at birth and in Experiment 2, we studied whether it depends on the relative rather than the absolute magnitude of numerousness. Fifty‐five‐hour‐old newborns, once habituated to a number (12), spontaneously associated a smaller number (4) with the left and a larger number (36) with the right side (Experiment 1). SNA in neonates is not absolute but relative. The same number (12) was associated with the left side rather than the right side whenever the previously experienced number was larger (36) rather than smaller (4) (Experiment 2). Control on continuous physical variables showed that the effect is specific of discrete magnitudes. These results constitute strong evidence that in our species SNA originates from pre‐linguistic and biological precursors in the brain.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 79%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

A mental number line in human newborns

Giorgio

Lunghi

Rugani

et al. 2019

Developmental Science

120

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Such kind of control for extraneous variables co-varying with counting has already been done in studies on numerosity perception involving some invertebrates, vertebrates and humans. Some species tested for their numerosity abilities could be controlled for co-variates by the introduction of simple changes in the presented cues, such as varying their size (in a spider: Rodríguez, Briceño, Briceño-Aguilar, & Höbel, 2015; in chimpanzees: Tomonaga, 2008), as well as their pattern (in pigeons: Emmerton & Renner, 2006; in gorillas and orangutans: Gazes, Diamond, Hope, Caillaud, Stoinski, & Hampton, 2017), or for food items, by changing their nature (in a grey parrot: Pepperberg, 2012) or pictures representing them (in an elephant: Irie, Hiraiwa-Hasegawa, & Kutsukake, 2019). Numerosity in other species was controlled for shape, size, brightness and location of presented cues (in a mosquito fish: Agrillo, Dadda, Serena, & Bisazza, 2009) or needed to be controlled with the help of time interval and dummies (in dogs and wolves: Range, Jenikejew, Schröder, & Virányi, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Influence of Shape, Color, Size and Relative Position of Elements on Their Counting by an Ant

Cammaerts¹,

Cammaerts²

2020

IJB

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It was previously shown that workers of the ant Myrmica sabuleti can discriminate small numbers of elements during testing when these elements were identical to those learned during training. Here we examine if this numerosity ability still subsists if the shape, color, size or location of the elements (dots) to count are modified between training and testing. We found that the ants’ counting ability was not significantly affected by changing one of these features although a somewhat lesser ability was observed. Among the changes, it was that of the relative position of the elements which disrupted the most the ants’ counting ability, followed by a change of their size. A change in the color or the shape affected the least the ants’ counting. These impacts of feature changes in the learned cues on the ants’ counting can be explained by characteristics of the visual perception of the species as well as by its behavioral ecology.

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“…Because this initial work dealt primarily with symbolic numerical stimuli ( Dehaene et al, 1993 ), and because it has since been shown that there is cross-cultural variation in the direction of these effects ( Zebian, 2005 ; Shaki et al, 2009 ), it was hypothesized that the mental number line arose from experience with linguistic conventions (i.e., reading and writing). Although cultural experience certainly modulates the directionality of one’s mental number line ( Shaki et al, 2009 ; McCrink et al, 2014 ), recent research using non-symbolic stimuli demonstrates directional effects in non-human animals ( Drucker and Brannon, 2014 ; Rugani et al, 2015 ) and preliterate children ( Patro and Haman, 2012 ; de Hevia et al, 2014 ), though the specific orientation of these directional effects may vary ( Cooperrider et al, 2017 ; Gazes et al, 2017 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Developing Mental Number Line: Does Its Directionality Relate to 5- to 7-Year-Old Children’s Mathematical Abilities?

Aulet

Lourenco

2018

Front. Psychol.

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Spatial representations of number, such as a left-to-right oriented mental number line, are well documented in Western culture. Yet, the functional significance of such a representation remains unclear. To test the prominent hypothesis that a mental number line may support mathematical development, we examined the relation between spatial-numerical associations (SNAs) and math proficiency in 5- to 7-year-old children. We found evidence of SNAs with two tasks: a non-symbolic magnitude comparison task, and a symbolic “Where was the number?” (WTN) task. Further, we found a significant correlation between these two tasks, demonstrating convergent validity of the directional mental number line across numerical format. Although there were no significant correlations between children’s SNAs on the WTN task and math ability, children’s SNAs on the magnitude comparison task were negatively correlated with their performance on a measure of cross-modal arithmetic, suggesting that children with a stronger left-to-right oriented mental number line were less competent at cross-modal arithmetic, an effect that held when controlling for age and a set of general cognitive abilities. Despite some evidence for a negative relation between SNAs and math ability in adulthood, we argue that the effect here may reflect task demands specific to the magnitude comparison task, not necessarily an impediment of the mental number line to math performance. We conclude with a discussion of the different properties that characterize a mental number line and how these different properties may relate to mathematical ability.

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Spatial representation of magnitude in gorillas and orangutans

Cited by 41 publications

References 43 publications

A mental number line in human newborns

A mental number line in human newborns

Influence of Shape, Color, Size and Relative Position of Elements on Their Counting by an Ant

The Developing Mental Number Line: Does Its Directionality Relate to 5- to 7-Year-Old Children’s Mathematical Abilities?

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