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Updated: May 11, 2026

An Automated Method for Assessing Visual Acuity in Infants and Toddlers Using an Eye-Tracking System
Published on: March 17, 2023
Education enhances the acuity of the nonverbal approximate number system
Manuela Piazza1, Pierre Pica, Véronique Izard
1Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, INSERM, Gif sur Yvette, France. manuela.piazza@unitn.it
Abstract:
All humans share a universal, evolutionarily ancient approximate number system (ANS) that estimates and combines the numbers of objects in sets with ratio-limited precision. Interindividual variability in the acuity of the ANS correlates with mathematical achievement, but the causes of this correlation have never been established. We acquired psychophysical measures of ANS acuity in child and adult members of an indigene group in the Amazon, the Mundurucú, who have a very restricted numerical lexicon and highly variable access to mathematics education. By comparing Mundurucú subjects with and without access to schooling, we found that education significantly enhances the acuity with which sets of concrete objects are estimated. These results indicate that culture and education have an important effect on basic number perception. We hypothesize that symbolic and nonsymbolic numerical thinking mutually enhance one another over the course of mathematics instruction.
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