Chinese children show sensitivity to transparency in number gestures earlier than Canadian children

Abstract

Chinese children often outperform North Americans in math, particularly rote skills. In the present study, we test whether Chinese children show advantages in tasks tapping abstract understanding of numeracy: processing unconventional number gestures. Previous research has shown that children from western cultures are not initially sensitive to the one-to-one correspondence in number gestures, showing difficulties interpreting unconventional gestures. Three- to five-year-old Chinese children were compared with same-aged English-speaking Canadian children on producing and interpreting number gestures. The Chinese children outperformed the Canadian children at all ages. Only younger Chinese children showed a small unconventional gesture disadvantage. These results suggest that Chinese children have early abstract understanding of number-related skills. While the Chinese children may follow the same pattern of development, the development is far accelerated relative to Canadian children.