Maciej Haman

The spatial–numerical congruity effect in preschoolers

Number-to-space mapping and its directionality are compelling topics in the study of numerical cognition. Usually, literacy and math education are thought to shape a left-to-right number line. We challenged this claim by analyzing performance of preliterate precounting preschoolers in a spatial-numerical task. In our experiment, children exhibited a spatial-numerical congruity (SNC) effect during a nonsymbolic numerosity comparison (quicker reaction times to smaller sets presented on the left side of the screen and to larger ones presented on the right side). These findings suggest that left-to-right number ordering may also have some sources that are independent of reading and math education. We argue that the current explanations of the spatial-numerical link need to be reconsidered.

How number-space relationships are assessed before formal schooling: A taxonomy proposal

The last years of research on numerical development have provided evidence that spatial-numerical associations (SNA) can be formed independent of formal school training. However, most of these studies used various experimental paradigms that referred to slightly different aspects of number and space processing. This poses a question of whether all SNAs described in the developmental literature can be interpreted as a unitary construct, or whether they are rather examples of different, but related phenomena. Our review aims to provide a starting point for a systematic classification of SNA measures used from infancy to late preschool years, and their underlying representations. We propose to distinguish among four basic SNA categories: (i) cross-dimensional magnitude processing, (ii) associations between spatial and numerical intervals, (iii) associations between cardinalities and spatial directions, (iv) associations between ordinalities and spatial directions. Such systematization allows for identifying similarities and differences between processes and representations that underlie the described measures, and also for assessing the adequacy of using different SNA tasks at different developmental stages.

Impaired Recognition of Communicative Interactions from Biological Motion in Schizophrenia

Background Patients with schizophrenia are deficient in multiple aspects of social cognition, including biological motion perception. In the present study we investigated the ability to read social information from point-light stimuli in schizophrenia. Methodology/Principal Findings Participants with paranoid schizophrenia and healthy controls were presented with a biological motion task depicting point-light actions of two agents either engaged in a communicative interaction, or acting independently of each other. For each stimulus, participants were asked to decide whether the two agents were communicating vs. acting independently of each other (task A), and to select the correct action description among five response alternatives (task B). Participants were also presented with a mental rotation task to assess their visuospatial abilities, and with a facial emotion recognition task tapping social cognition. Results revealed that participants with schizophrenia performed overall worse than controls both in discriminating communicative from non-communicative actions (task A) and in selecting which of the 5 response alternatives best described the observed actions (task B). Interestingly, the impaired performance of schizophrenic participants was mainly due to misclassification of non-communicative stimuli as communicative actions. Correlation analysis revealed that visuospatial abilities predicted performance in task A but not in task B, while facial emotion recognition abilities was correlated with performance in both task A and task B. Conclusions/Significance These findings are consistent with theories of “overmentalizing” (excessive attribution of intentionality) in schizophrenia, and suggest that processing social information from biological motion does rely on social cognition abilities.

The Multilingual CID-5: A New Tool to Study the Perception of Communicative Interactions in Different Languages

The investigation of the ability to perceive, recognize, and judge upon social intentions, such as communicative intentions, on the basis of body motion is a growing research area. Cross-cultural differences in ability to perceive and interpret biological motion, however, have been poorly investigated so far. Progress in this domain strongly depends on the availability of suitable stimulus material. In the present method paper, we describe the multilingual CID-5, an extension of the CID-5 database, allowing for the investigation of how non-conventional communicative gestures are classified and identified by speakers of different languages. The CID-5 database contains 14 communicative interactions and 7 non-communicative actions performed by couples of agents and presented as point-light displays. For each action, the database provides movie files with the point-light animation, text files with the 3-D spatial coordinates of the point-lights, and five different response alternatives. In the multilingual CID-5 the alternatives were translated into seven languages (Chinese, Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, and Polish). Preliminary data collected to assess the recognizability of the actions in the different languages suggest that, for most of the action stimuli, information presented in point-light displays is sufficient for the distinctive classification of the action as communicative vs. individual, as well as for identification of the specific communicative gesture performed by the actor in all the available languages.

Playing Reading, Using Hands: Which Activities are Linked to Number-Space Processing in Preschool Children?

Abstract Literate subjects from Western cultures form spatial-numerical associations (SNA) in left-to-right direction, which follows their reading habits. In preliterate children, sources of SNA directionality are more disputable. One possibility is that SNA follows childrens early knowledge about text orientation. It could also reflect ipsilateral/contralateral tendencies in manual task execution. Furthermore, SNAs characteristics could differ depending on the evaluation method used. In this study, we test SNA in preliterate preschoolers using object counting, finger counting, and numerosity arrangement tasks. We examined the relations of SNA to childrens directional reading knowledge and their manual response tendencies. Left-to-right SNA was pronounced for object counting, disappeared for the numerosity task, and was reversed for finger counting. In all tasks, left-to-right SNA dominated in children who responded contralaterally with their hand. Reading knowledge was partially related to numerosity-based SNA, but not to other SNAs. Based on these findings, we discuss developmental characteristics of different forms of number-space associations.

A Mental Odd-Even Continuum Account: Some Numbers May Be “More Odd” Than Others and Some Numbers May Be “More Even” Than Others

Numerical categories such as parity, i.e., being odd or even, have frequently been shown to influence how particular numbers are processed. Mathematically, number parity is defined categorically. So far, cognitive, and psychological accounts have followed the mathematical definition and defined parity as a categorical psychological representation as well. In this manuscript, we wish to test the alternative account that cognitively, parity is represented in a more gradual manner such that some numbers are represented as “more odd” or “more even” than other odd or even numbers, respectively. Specifically, parity processing might be influenced by more specific properties such as whether a number is a prime, a square number, a power of 2, part of a multiplication table, divisible by 4 or by 5, and many others. We suggest that these properties can influence the psychologically represented parity of a number, making it more or less prototypical for odd- or evenness. In the present study, we tested the influence of these numerical properties in a bimanual parity judgment task with auditorily presented two-digit numbers. Additionally, we further investigated the interaction of these numerical properties with linguistic factors in three language groups (English, German, and Polish). Results show significant effects on reaction times of the congruity of parity status between decade and unit digits, even if numerical magnitude and word frequency are controlled. We also observed other effects of the above specific numerical properties, such as multiplication attributes, which facilitated or interfered with the speed of parity judgment. Based on these effects of specific numerical properties we proposed and elaborated a parity continuum account. However, our cross-lingual study also suggests that parity representation and/or access seem to depend on the linguistic properties of the respective language or education and culture. Overall, the results suggest that the “perceived” parity is not the same as objective parity, and some numbers are more prototypical exemplars of their categories.

Altered video task: a non-verbal measure of what-who-where recall in young children

ABSTRACT This report aims to introduce, test and discuss a new method of measuring episodic memory in participants with highly restricted verbal abilities. Although an elicited/deferred imitation paradigm has already proposed a successful method of measuring this capacity in infants as young as 6 months old [Bauer, Patricia J. 2006. “Constructing a Past in Infancy: A Neuro-Developmental Account.” Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10 (4): 175–181], it failed to include a measure of capacities crucial for episodic recall, that is: a sense of self, a sense of subjective time and autonoetic consciousness [Tulving, Endel. 2002. “Episodic Memory: From Mind to Brain.” Annual Reviews Psychology 53: 1–25]. We combined developmental and comparative approaches in the altered video task to allow for simultaneous measuring of episodic recall and autonoetic consciousness. Episodic recall was measured via presentation of non-modified and modified recordings of a personal past event after a 24-h delay. The 15-month-old infants were expected to watch the modified video significantly longer than the non-modified video, and so evince the differentiation between them. Alongside, the infants participated in a mirror-mark task (a standard measure of self-recognition) and in a real-time video task (a possible alternative for the mirror-mark task). Results for ‘what’ and ‘who’ were consistent with our expectations. All results, their implications and possible future directions are discussed.

Internally-driven change and feature correspondence in object representation: A key to children's essentialism?

Internally-driven change and feature correspondence in object representation: A key to childrens essentialism? Two experiments were run to investigate how preschoolers use the pattern of an objects change as a cue to noticing correlations among the objects subsequent features. Four-year-old children were familiarized with either an internally or externally-driven transformation of an object, and tested for identification of an animation that did not match the familiar sequence of the objects features. In both experiments children in the internal-change group identified the incorrect sequence significantly more quickly than in the external-change condition. These results strongly suggest that perception of internally-driven transformation facilitates the formation of and/or access to a representation of correspondences between subsequent features of an object. The possible role of this mechanism in essentialist thinking is discussed at the end of the paper.