Abstract
Early mathematical development relies upon the ability to translate between spoken number words and Arabic digits. Few studies have investigated whether differences in number word structure influence transcoding and its relationship with mathematics. We tested number writing and arithmetic in 177 German-speaking and 309 English-speaking Year 1 children. In English number words the order of tens and units (e.g., twenty-five) follows the written order of the Arabic digits (e.g., 25), whereas German number words are inverted (e.g., ‘fünfundzwanzig’, five-and-twenty). Transcoding at the item level was strongly influenced by number word inversion. German-speaking children made more errors transcoding two-digit numbers. However, English-speaking children made more errors writing teens, which are exceptional in English because of their inverted structure. Nevertheless, number writing was a significant predictor of arithmetic in both languages highlighting a significant relationship between transcoding ability and arithmetic for languages with and without number word inversion.
Highlights
Transcoding between spoken number words and Arabic digits works seamlessly in most adults
Our second aim was to investigate the concurrent relationship between the ability to write two-digit numbers correctly from dictation and arithmetic performance in English- and German-speaking children. We investigated this relationship in both language groups in order to determine whether the relationship between transcoding ability and arithmetic reported in previous studies can be attributed to syntactic complexity, i.e., number word inversion
We found two-digit number writing to be a unique concurrent predictor of arithmetic in German and in English, showing that the relationship between transcoding ability and arithmetic is not driven by number word inversion
Summary
Transcoding between spoken number words and Arabic digits works seamlessly in most adults. Individual differences in transcoding are associated with concurrent arithmetic performance (Geary, Hoard, & Hamson, 1999; Simmons, Willis, & Adams, 2012; Sowinski et al, 2015); the mechanisms underlying this relationship are not yet clear. Language-specific morphology such as number word inversion might play a role. The aim of the current study was to investigate the influence of language, number word inversion, upon transcoding and its relationship with arithmetic in early primary school. Transcoding: from number words to Arabic digits
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