Specificity of children’s arithmetic learning

Abstract

Among adults, arithmetic training–transfer studies have documented a high degree of learning specificity. Provided that there is a delay of at least 1day between training and testing, performance gains do not transfer to untrained problems, nor do they transfer to complement operation-inverted problems (e.g., gains for 4+7=__ do not transfer to the complement subtraction problem, 11−4=__, or vice versa). Here we demonstrate the same degree of learning specificity among 6- to 11-year-old children. These results appear to rule out, for the current training paradigm, operation-level procedural learning as well as any variant of complement problem mediation that would predict transfer. Results are consistent with either or both of two types of learning: (a) item-level procedural learning and (b) a shift to memory-based performance as predicted by the elemental elements model. These results suggest a developmental pattern such that specificity of learning among children is similar to that among adults. Educational implications are noted.