Relaciones entre procesamiento de magnitudes numéricas y ejecución en aritméticaUn estudio longitudinal

Résumé

Recent research suggest that individual differences in arithmetic are related to the ability to process numerical magnitudes. A key question in this emerging field of research is which skills related to the magnitude processing predict the mathematical competence: either no symbolic magnitude processing, or the access to those magnitudes from the symbolic numbers. Although individual differences have been linked to both skills, existing studies are insufficient and inconclusive. This paper analyzes this issue in a longitudinal study. For this, a large number of tasks were used. All of them were tasks related to the magnitude processing and have proven their relation with the arithmetic performance but no study has used them in the same sample. In addition, this study used two-digit numerical quantities in all tasks. This is something not considered in other studies so far. The tasks were applied to 52 children in Grade 1, along with an intelligence test and an arithmetic test. In Grade 3 they were assessed in arithmetic performance. Hierarchical regression analyzes showed that only measures relating to the symbolic magnitude processing were related two years after the arithmetic achievement beyond that explained by intelligence. The complete model explained 45% of the variance and variables related to the magnitude processing accounted for an additional 37% of the variance. Moreover, these measures contributed additional 13% to variance in mathematical performance even after controlling arithmetic performance. The present study extends previous results by demonstrating the efficacy to access the magnitude from symbolic two-digit quantities relates to the arithmetic performance.