Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

From school climate to brain development: What the ABCD study reveals about the educational context of adolescence.

Developmental cognitive neuroscience·2026

Same author

Toward precision EEG: assessing the reliability of individual-level ERPs across EEG systems.

Frontiers in human neuroscience·2026

Same author

Steady-state EEG captures how elementary classroom instruction drives plasticity for novel visual words.

NPJ science of learning·2025

Same author

Cortical latency predicts reading fluency from late childhood to early adolescence.

Developmental cognitive neuroscience·2025

Same author

Tablet-based arithmetic fluency assessment reveals developments in math cognition and math achievement from childhood to adolescence.

NPJ science of learning·2025

Same author

Differences in educational opportunity predict white matter development.

Developmental cognitive neuroscience·2024

Same journal

Executive function and preschoolers' responses to severe transgressions: implications for early forgiveness.

Journal of experimental child psychology·2026

Same journal

Shared cognitive risk factors underlying rapid automatized naming deficits for the comorbidity of developmental dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: A computational parameter estimation via Bundesen's theory of visual attention.

Journal of experimental child psychology·2026

Same journal

Do young children understand the objectivity of reality?

Journal of experimental child psychology·2026

Same journal

Learning words by ear or by eye: effects of modality on lexical configuration and lexicalization.

Journal of experimental child psychology·2026

Same journal

Thinking outside the Box: Causal uncertainty motivates children's over-imitation.

Journal of experimental child psychology·2026

Same journal

Effects of parental intervention on children's English utterances and behavioral responses in video-based second language learning.

Journal of experimental child psychology·2026

See all related articles

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Nov 13, 2025

Portable Intermodal Preferential Looking IPL: Investigating Language Comprehension in Typically Developing Toddlers and Young Children with Autism

Portable Intermodal Preferential Looking IPL: Investigating Language Comprehension in Typically Developing Toddlers and Young Children with Autism

Published on: December 14, 2012

A probabilistic approach for quantifying children's subitizing span.

Gillian S Starkey¹, Bruce D McCandliss²

¹Center for Psychology, Goucher College, Baltimore, MD 21204, USA.

Journal of Experimental Child Psychology

|March 14, 2021

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

This study introduces a new probabilistic method to measure subitizing, the ability to instantly recognize small quantities. This approach accurately tracks children's subitizing development and predicts math skills.

Keywords:

Cognitive development Early numeracy Enumeration Mathematics development Numerical cognition Subitizing

More Related Videos

Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism

Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism

Published on: October 3, 2018

Measuring Statistical Learning Across Modalities and Domains in School-Aged Children Via an Online Platform and Neuroimaging Techniques

Measuring Statistical Learning Across Modalities and Domains in School-Aged Children Via an Online Platform and Neuroimaging Techniques

Published on: June 30, 2020

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Nov 13, 2025

Portable Intermodal Preferential Looking IPL: Investigating Language Comprehension in Typically Developing Toddlers and Young Children with Autism

Portable Intermodal Preferential Looking IPL: Investigating Language Comprehension in Typically Developing Toddlers and Young Children with Autism

Published on: December 14, 2012

Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism

Using the Visual World Paradigm to Study Sentence Comprehension in Mandarin-Speaking Children with Autism

Published on: October 3, 2018

Measuring Statistical Learning Across Modalities and Domains in School-Aged Children Via an Online Platform and Neuroimaging Techniques

Measuring Statistical Learning Across Modalities and Domains in School-Aged Children Via an Online Platform and Neuroimaging Techniques

Published on: June 30, 2020

Area of Science:

Cognitive Development
Numerical Cognition
Educational Psychology

Background:

Childhood enumeration skills develop through subitizing (small sets) and serial counting (large sets).
Measuring subitizing capacity in children is challenging due to developmental variability and counting improvements.
Traditional adult methods for assessing subitizing are problematic for young children.

Purpose of the Study:

To demonstrate limitations in traditional subitizing assessment for children.
To propose and validate a novel probabilistic approach for measuring children's subitizing capacity.
To investigate the relationship between subitizing and symbolic arithmetic ability in elementary school children.

Main Methods:

Assessed elementary school children's subitizing capacity using a novel probabilistic metric.
Compared the probabilistic metric with traditional assessment challenges.
Correlated subitizing capacity with performance on symbolic arithmetic tasks.

Main Results:

The probabilistic metric effectively captured developmental trends in children's subitizing.
The proposed metric demonstrated predictive validity for symbolic arithmetic ability.
This approach overcomes limitations of traditional methods in developmental populations.

Conclusions:

A probabilistic approach offers a more accurate and reliable method for measuring subitizing in young children.
Subitizing plays a foundational role in the development of mathematical cognition.
This metric is suitable for future research on subitizing and mathematics development.