General Magnitude Representation in Human Infants

• Type of Material: Article
• Authors: Stella Lourenco, Emory University; Matthew R. Longo, University College London
• Language: English
• Date: 2010-06
• Publisher: Association for Psychological Science
• Publication Version: Author Accepted Manuscript (After Peer Review)
• Copyright Statement: © The Author(s) 2010
• Final Published Version (URL): http://pss.sagepub.com/content/21/6/873
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: Psychological Science
• ISSN: 0956-7976
• Volume: 21
• Issue: 6
• Start Page: 873
• End Page: 881
• Grant/Funding Information: National Institute of Child Health & Human Development : NICHD; This research was supported by award number R03HD059993 from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development (NICHD) to Stella F. Lourenco.
• Research Categories: Biology, Neuroscience; Psychology, General

Abstract

Behavioral demonstrations of reciprocal interactions among the dimensions of space, number, and time, along with evidence of shared neural mechanisms in posterior parietal cortex, are consistent with a common representational code for general magnitude information. Although much recent speculation has concerned the developmental origins of a system of general magnitude representation, direct evidence in preverbal infants is lacking. Here we show that 9-month-olds transfer associative learning across magnitude dimensions. For example, if shown that larger objects were black with stripes and smaller objects were white with dots, infants expected the same color/pattern mapping to hold for numerosity (i.e., greater numerosity: black/stripes; smaller numerosity: white/dots) and duration (i.e., longer-lasting objects: black/stripes; shorter-lasting objects: white/dots). Cross-dimensional transfer occurred bi-directionally for all combinations of size, numerosity, and duration. These results provide support for an early-developing and pre-linguistic general magnitude system, whereby representations of magnitude information are (at least partially) abstracted from the specific dimensions.