The development and predictors of school-age children’s nonsymbolic number comparison abilities: Modulated by congruency between numerosity and visual cues

Abstract

Children’s abilities to compare two sets of nonsymbolic numbers improve throughout development. However, it remains unclear whether the improvement is driven by a more precise internal representation of numerosity or an enhanced ability to resist interference from visual cues. To address this question, we conducted a one-year longitudinal study with 112 children (M_age = 8 years and 9 months, SD = 7 months at T1), comparing performance changes in two conditions — the numerosity and visual cues of the nonsymbolic sets were either congruent (e.g., the more numerous dot set has larger dot sizes) or incongruent (e.g., the more numerous dot set has smaller dot sizes). Besides, to better understand the cognitive mechanism underlying improvements in nonsymbolic number comparison, we compared the predictors of performance changes in both conditions. We found significant improvement in children’s performance on the incongruent condition but not the congruent condition. Working memory and symbolic numerical magnitude representation predicted changes in the congruent condition, while cognitive flexibility predicted changes in the incongruent condition. These findings suggest that the development and predictors of children’s nonsymbolic number comparison abilities are modulated by the congruency between numerosity and visual cues. For children aged 8–10, improvements in nonsymbolic number comparison abilities are mainly driven by the increasing ability to resist interference from visual cues.