Inhibitory Processes, Working Memory, Phonological Awareness, Naming Speed, and Early Arithmetic Achievement

Abstract

This study identified the cognitive processes that underlie the individual differences in early mathematical performance in elementary school children. Taking into account the Baddeley framework multicomponent model, the inhibitory processes, working memory, phonological awareness, and naming speed are considered to be related to early math learning. To examine this relationship, we compared the performance of a total of 424 typically developing middle-class children, aged between 4 and 7 years in a battery of cognitive and early numeric tests: The Utrecht Early Numeracy Test, the Rapid Automatized Naming Test, Spanish version of the Stroop task, the Numeracy Interference Test, Digit Span test, and Phonological Knowledge Test. The mean age of the participants was 72.21 months (sd = 14.8), and 48.6% were male and 51.4% were female. The results demonstrated that children performing worst on central executive, phonological processing, and inhibitory processes showed lower results in early mathematical tasks measured by The Utrecht Early Numeracy Test. Results supported the notion that the executive system is an important predictor of children's mathematical performance.

Working memory and mathematics in primary school children: A meta-analysis

“…Evidence of a distinction between these two factors has been found using factor analysis (Oberauer et al, 2003), which is why this distinction is employed in this study. Visuospatial updating has consistently been found to be associated with mathematical performance (St Clair-Thompson and Gathercole, 2006), whereas verbal updating has been found to have a unique association with mathematical skills in some studies (Jarvis and Gathercole, 2003;Navarro et al, 2011), but not in others (St Clair-Thompson and Gathercole, 2006).…”

Phonological awareness intervention for verbal working memory skills in school-age children with specific language impairment and concomitant word reading difficulties

“…Oakhill and Kyle (2000) have found that central executive function plays an important role in phonological awareness tasks as well (e.g., the rhyme oddity task). Navarro et al (2011) also found a strong correlation between central executive and phonological awareness tasks in a group of 424 typically developing children (age: 4 to 7 years). Thus, successful phonemic deletion is also contingent upon the capacity of verbal working memory to store the target word and locate the phoneme to be deleted.…”

The role of cognitive inhibition in different components of arithmetic

“…Stroop tasks have frequently been employed in studies exploring the relationship of inhibition with mathematics performance (e.g. Bull and Scerif 2001;Lemaire and Lecacheur 2011;Monette et al 2011;Navarro et al 2011;St Clair-Thompson and Gathercole 2006;Szucs et al 2013;Van der Ven et al 2012;Visu-Petra et al 2011).…”