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Updated: Nov 10, 2025

Multimedia Battery for Assessment of Cognitive and Basic Skills in Mathematics BM-PROMA
Published on: August 28, 2021
Separable effects of the approximate number system, symbolic number knowledge, and number ordering ability on early
Stephanie A Malone1, Verena E Pritchard2, Charles Hulme3
1Australian Catholic University, Brisbane, QLD 4014, Australia; Autism Centre of Excellence, Griffith University, Brisbane, QLD 4122, Australia.
Abstract:
There is evidence that early variations in the development of an approximate number system (ANS) and symbolic number understanding are both influences on the later development of formal arithmetic skills. We report a large-scale (N = 552) longitudinal study of the predictors of arithmetic spanning a critical developmental period (the first 3 years of formal education). Variations in early knowledge of symbolic representations of number and the ordinal associations between them are direct predictors of later arithmetic skills. The development of number ordering ability is in turn predicted by earlier variations in arithmetic, the ANS (numerosity judgments), and rapid automatized naming (RAN). These findings have important implications for theories of numerical and arithmetical development and potentially for the teaching of these skills.
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