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. 2021 Mar 25:12:584183.
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.584183. eCollection 2021.

Numerical Magnitude Processing in Deaf Adolescents and Its Contribution to Arithmetical Ability

Lilan Chen  1 , Yan Wang  2 , Hongbo Wen  3
Affiliations

Numerical Magnitude Processing in Deaf Adolescents and Its Contribution to Arithmetical Ability

Lilan Chen et al. Front Psychol. .

Abstract

Although most deaf individuals could use sign language or sign/spoken language mix, hearing loss would still affect their language acquisition. Compensatory plasticity holds that the lack of auditory stimulation experienced by deaf individuals, such as congenital deafness, can be met by enhancements in visual cognition. And the studies of hearing individuals have showed that visual form perception is the cognitive mechanism that could explain the association between numerical magnitude processing and arithmetic computation. Therefore, we examined numerical magnitude processing and its contribution to arithmetical ability in deaf adolescents, and explored the differences between the congenital and acquired deafness. 112 deaf adolescents (58 congenital deafness) and 58 hearing adolescents performed a series of cognitive and mathematical tests, and it was found there was no significant differences between the congenital group and the hearing group, but congenital group outperformed acquired group in numerical magnitude processing (reaction time) and arithmetic computation. It was also found there was a close association between numerical magnitude processing and arithmetic computation in all deaf adolescents, and after controlling for the demographic variables (age, gender, onset of hearing loss) and general cognitive abilities (non-verbal IQ, processing speed, reading comprehension), numerical magnitude processing could predict arithmetic computation in all deaf adolescents but not in congenital group. The role of numerical magnitude processing (symbolic and non-symbolic) in deaf adolescents' mathematical performance should be paid attention in the training of arithmetical ability.

Keywords: acquired deafness; arithmetic computation; congenital deafness; mathematical cognition; numerical magnitude representation.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Mean accuracy (%) on the numerical magnitude comparison task (symbolic and non-symbolic) across groups.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Mean reaction time (ms) on the numerical magnitude comparison task (symbolic and non-symbolic) across groups.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Mean adjusted scores on the arithmetic computation tasks (simple and complex subtraction) across groups.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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