Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T16:40:38.969Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Bridging the gap between intuitive and formal number concepts: An epidemiological perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2008

Helen De Cruz
Helen De Cruz
Affiliation:
Centre for Logic and Philosophy of Science, Free University of Brussels, 1050 Brussels, Belgium; and Centre for Logic and Analytical Philosophy, University of Leuven, 3000 Leuven, [email protected]://www.vub.ac.be/CLWF/members/helen/index.shtml
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The failure of current bootstrapping accounts to explain the emergence of the concept of natural numbers does not entail that no link exists between intuitive and formal number concepts. The epidemiology of representations allows us to explain similarities between intuitive and formal number concepts without requiring that the latter are directly constructed from the former.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 31 , Issue 6 , December 2008 , pp. 649 - 650
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Castelli, F., Glaser, D. & Butterworth, B. (2006) Discrete and analogue quantity processing in the parietal lobe: A functional MRI study. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 103:4693–98.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Cruz, H. (2006) Why are some numerical concepts more successful than others? An evolutionary perspective on the history of number concepts. Evolution and Human Behavior 27:306–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fischer, M. H. (2003) Cognitive representation of negative numbers. Psychological Science 14:278–82.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lipton, J. S. & Spelke, E. S. (2006) Preschool children master the logic of number word meanings. Cognition 98:B57–B66.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nichols, S. (2002) On the genealogy of norms: a case for the role of emotion in cultural evolution. Philosophy of Science 69:234–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vlassis, J. (2004) Making sense of the minus sign or becoming flexible in “negativity”. Learning and Instruction 14:469–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar