Conservation Abilities, Visuospatial Skills, and Numerosity Processing Speed: Association With Math Achievement and Math Difficulties in Elementary School Children
Abstract
The aim of the present study was to investigate the associations between elementary school children’s mathematical achievement and their conservation abilities, visuospatial skills, and numerosity processing speed. We also assessed differences in these abilities between children with different types of learning problems. In Study 1 ( N = 229), we investigated second to fourth graders and in Study 2 ( N = 120), third and fourth graders. Analyses revealed significant contributions of numerosity processing speed and visuospatial skills to math achievement beyond IQ. Conservation abilities were predictive in Study 1 only. Children with math difficulties showed lower visuospatial skills and conservation abilities than children with typical achievement levels and children with reading and/or spelling difficulties, whereas children with combined difficulties explicitly showed low conservation abilities. These findings provide further evidence for the relations between children’s math skills and their visuospatial skills, conservation abilities, and processing speed and contribute to the understanding of deficits that are specific to mathematical difficulties.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Some studies have found significant processing speed deficits in children with math disorder compared to typically-developing counterparts.
“some studies have found significant PS deficits in children with MD when compared to their typically-developing counterparts12,19,20”
From Diagnostic Associations of Processing Speed in a Transdiagnostic, Pediatric Sample (2020) · cites this paper as [20]
Comorbidity amongst math disorder, reading disorder, and ADHD has been associated with low processing speed.
“comorbidity amongst MD, RD, and ADHD has also been associated with low PS, and the relationships between these deficits continue to be explored20,40–44.”
From Diagnostic Associations of Processing Speed in a Transdiagnostic, Pediatric Sample (2020) · cites this paper as [20]
Cites
Conway, A. R. A., Cowan, N., Bunting, M. F., Therriault, D. J., & Minkoff, S. R. B. (2002) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/s0160-2896(01)00096-4 · Cited by 1,108 · see citing works
Developmental dyscalculia and basic numerical capacities: a study of 8–9-year-old students
Landerl, K., Bevan, A., & Butterworth, B. (2004) · Cognition · doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2003.11.004 · Cited by 907 · see citing works
Dyslexia and dyscalculia: two learning disorders with different cognitive profiles
Landerl, K., Fussenegger, B., Moll, K., & Willburger, E. (2009) · Journal of Experimental Child Psychology · doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2009.03.006 · Cited by 409 · cited 5× · see citing works
“Second, many studies have shown that children with combined problems tend to show an even lower general competence level on numerous cognitive competences and lower growth rates than children with MD only (e.g., Jordan et al., 2003; Jordan, Hanich, & Kaplan, 2002; Landerl et al., 2009).”
BackgroundResultInfluentialWorking memory deficits in children with specific learning disorders
Schuchardt, K., Maehler, C., & Hasselhorn, M. (2008) · Journal of Learning Disabilities · doi:10.1177/0022219408317856 · Cited by 254 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Diagnostic Associations of Processing Speed in a Transdiagnostic, Pediatric Sample
Kramer, E., Koo, B., Restrepo, A., Koyama, M., Neuhaus, R., Pugh, K., Andreotti, C., & Milham, M. (2020) · Scientific Reports · doi:10.1038/s41598-020-66892-z · Cited by 28 · see citing works
- Authors
- Lambert, K., & Spinath, B.
- Affiliations
- University of Tübingen (DE)
- Heidelberg University (DE)
- Corresponding author
- Lambert, Katharina
- ORCID
- Spinath, Birgit
- Venue
- Journal of Learning Disabilities
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2017-01-24
- Volume
- 51
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 223-235
- ISSN
- 0022-2194 (ISSN-L)
- 1538-4780
- OpenAlex
- W2770073486
- Cited by
- 36
- References
- 4
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 2 · 2017: 1
- FWCI
- 1.72
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Learning Disabilities (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Science, Education and the Arts
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Mathematics › Statistics and Probability › Cognitive and developmental aspects of mathematical skills
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology › Developmental and Educational Neuropsychology
- Physical Sciences › Mathematics › Applied Mathematics › Mathematics Education and Pedagogy
- Keywords
- visuospatial ability, mathematics achievement, mathematics learning difficulties, elementary school students, reading and spelling difficulties, cognitive ability
- MeSH terms
- Academic Success, Aptitude, Child, Female, Humans, Learning Disabilities, Male, Mathematics, Space Perception, Thinking, Visual Perception, Mathematical Concepts
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
