Transparent number-naming system gives only limited advantage for preschooler's numerical development: Comparisons of Vietnamese and French-speaking children.

ABSTRACT: Several cross-sectional studies have suggested that the transparency of the number-naming system of East Asian languages (Chinese, Japanese) facilitates children's numerical development. The Vietnamese number-naming system also makes the base-10 system very explicit (eleven is "mười một," literally "ten-one," and thirty is "ba mươi," literally "three-ten"). In contrast, Western languages (English, French) include teen words (eleven to sixteen) and ten words (twenty to ninety) that make their counting systems less transparent. The main question addressed in this paper is: To what extent does a language's number-naming system impact preschoolers' numerical development? Our study participants comprised 104 Vietnamese and 104 French-speaking Belgian children between 3½ and 5½ years of age, as

SUBMITTER: Le MT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7721146 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature