The internal representation of arithmetical word problem sentences: Frontal and posterior-injured patients compared

Abstract

Patients with frontal and left posterior brain lesions have severe difficulties in arithmetical word problem solving. In the present study the origin of these difficulties is investigated from an information-processing perspective. Following this perspective the first stage in word problem solving consists of a translation of individual sentences to an internal representation. This translation process is examined in 30 frontal patients, 10 left posterior-injured patients, and 10 healthy controls with a recognition and a sentence-picture matching task. In addition, the relationship between sentence representation and arithmetical word problem solving is studied. The results suggest that error rates in the translation of different types of arithmetical word problem propositions differ substantially in our three groups. A relationship between translation skills and arithmetical word problem solving ability is also found.