Numerical cognition without words: evidence from Amazonia. Gordon, P. Science, 306(5695):496–499, 2004. doi abstract bibtex Members of the Pirah" tribe use a "one-two-many" system of counting. I ask whether speakers of this innumerate language can appreciate larger numerosities without the benefit of words to encode them. This addresses the classic Whorfian question about whether language can determine thought. Results of numerical tasks with varying cognitive demands show that numerical cognition is clearly affected by the lack of a counting system in the language. Performance with quantities greater than three was remarkably poor, but showed a constant coefficient of variation, which is suggestive of an analog estimation process.
@Article{Gordon2004,
author = {Peter Gordon},
journal = {Science},
title = {Numerical cognition without words: evidence from Amazonia.},
year = {2004},
number = {5695},
pages = {496--499},
volume = {306},
abstract = {Members of the Pirah" tribe use a "one-two-many" system of counting.
I ask whether speakers of this innumerate language can appreciate
larger numerosities without the benefit of words to encode them.
This addresses the classic Whorfian question about whether language
can determine thought. Results of numerical tasks with varying cognitive
demands show that numerical cognition is clearly affected by the
lack of a counting system in the language. Performance with quantities
greater than three was remarkably poor, but showed a constant coefficient
of variation, which is suggestive of an analog estimation process.},
doi = {10.1126/science.1094492},
institution = {SA. pgordon@tc.columbia.edu},
keywords = {Adolescent; Adult; Brazil; Cognition; Female; Humans; Indians, South American; Language; Linguistics; Male; Mathematics; Thinking; Vocabulary},
language = {eng},
medline-pst = {ppublish},
pmid = {15319490},
timestamp = {2010.12.04},
}
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