When Numbers Get Heavy: Is the Mental Number Line Exclusively Numerical?

• Type of Material: Article
• Authors: Stella Lourenco, Emory University; Kevin J. Holmes, University of California, Berkeley
• Language: English
• Date: 2013-03-06
• Publisher: Public Library of Science
• Publication Version: Final Published Version
• Copyright Statement: © 2013 Holmes, Lourenco.
• License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Final Published Version (URL): http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0058381
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: PLoS ONE
• ISSN: 1932-6203
• Volume: 8
• Issue: 3
• Start Page: e58381
• End Page: e58381
• Grant/Funding Information: This research was supported by a Scholars Award from the John Merck Fund (www.jmfund.org) to SFL.
• Keywords: SNARC; mental number line
• Research Categories: Psychology, General

Abstract

The mental number line, with its left-to-right orientation of increasing numerical values, is often regarded as evidence for a unique connection between space and number. Yet left-to-right orientation has been shown to extend to other dimensions, consistent with a general magnitude system wherein different magnitudes share neural and conceptual resources. Such observations raise a fundamental, yet relatively unexplored, question about spatial-numerical associations: What is the nature of the information represented along the mental number line? Here we show that this information is not exclusive to number, simultaneously accommodating numerical and non-numerical magnitudes. Participants completed the classic SNARC (Spatial-Numerical Association of Response Codes) task while sometimes wearing wrist weights. Weighting the left wrist–thereby linking less and more weight to right and left, respectively–worked against left-to-right orientation of number, leaving no behavioral trace of the mental number line. Our findings point to the dynamic integration of magnitude dimensions, with spatial organization instantiating representational currency (i.e., more/less relations) shared across magnitudes.