Task instructions determine the visuospatial and verbal-spatial nature of number-space associations

Evidence for number-space associations comes from the spatial-numerical association of response codes (SNARC) effect, consisting in faster reaction times to small/large digits with the left/right hand, respectively. Two different proposals are commonly discussed concerning the cognitive origin of th...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Quarterly journal of experimental psychology (2006) 2015-09, Vol.68 (9), p.1895-1909
Main Authors: Georges, Carrie, Schiltz, Christine, Hoffmann, Danielle
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adolescent
Adult
Analysis of Variance
Association
Cognitive origin
Female
Functional Laterality
Humans
Judgment
Male
Mathematics
Number-space associations
Photic Stimulation
Psychomotor Performance
Reaction Time - physiology
Space Perception - physiology
Spatial-numerical association of response codes effect
Verbal Behavior - physiology
Verbal-spatial
Visuospatial
Young Adult
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Summary:Evidence for number-space associations comes from the spatial-numerical association of response codes (SNARC) effect, consisting in faster reaction times to small/large digits with the left/right hand, respectively. Two different proposals are commonly discussed concerning the cognitive origin of the SNARC effect: the visuospatial account and the verbal-spatial account. Recent studies have provided evidence for the relative dominance of verbal-spatial over visuospatial coding mechanisms, when both mechanisms were directly contrasted in a magnitude comparison task. However, in these studies, participants were potentially biased towards verbal-spatial number processing by task instructions based on verbal-spatial labels. To overcome this confound and to investigate whether verbal-spatial coding mechanisms are predominantly activated irrespective of task instructions, we completed the previously used paradigm by adding a spatial instruction condition. In line with earlier findings, we could confirm the predominance of verbal-spatial number coding under verbal task instructions. However, in the spatial instruction condition, both verbal-spatial and visuospatial mechanisms were activated to an equal extent. Hence, these findings clearly indicate that the cognitive origin of number-space associations does not always predominantly rely on verbal-spatial processing mechanisms, but that the spatial code associated with numbers is context dependent.
ISSN:1747-0218
1747-0226
DOI:10.1080/17470218.2014.997764