Prepulse Inhibition and P50 Suppression in Relation to Creativity and Attention: Dispersed Attention Beneficial to Quantitative but Not Qualitative Measures of Divergent Thinking.

The current study investigated whether lower sensory and sensorimotor gating were related to higher levels of creativity and/or attentional difficulties in a natural population of primary school children (9- to 13-year-old). Gating abilities were measured with P50 suppression and prepulse inhibition of the startle reflex (PPI). The final sample included 65 participants in the P50 analyses and 37 participants in the PPI analyses.

Sex differences in the association of math achievement with visual-spatial and verbal working memory: Does the type of math test matter?

Previous research on sex differences in mathematical achievement shows mixed findings, which have been argued to depend on types of math tests used and the type of solution strategies (i.e., verbal versus visual-spatial) these tests evoke.

The Contribution of Executive Functions in Predicting Mathematical Creativity in Typical Elementary School Classes: A Twofold Role for Updating.

The goal of the current study was to investigate the role of executive functions in mathematical creativity. The sample included 278 primary school children (ages 8-13). Two models were compared: the starting model tested whether executive functions (shifting, updating, and inhibition), domain-general creativity, and mathematical ability directly predicted mathematical creativity.

Effects of Digital Learning Materials on nursing students' mathematics learning, self-efficacy, and task value in vocational education.

The use of digital environments in nursing education offers new opportunities for nursing students' medical mathematics learning. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of Digital Learning Materials (DLMs) on nursing students' mathematics learning, self-efficacy, and task value. A pre-test/post-test control group design was used.

Associative Cognitive Factors of Math Problems in Students Diagnosed With Developmental Dyscalculia.

The Dutch protocol, 'Dyscalculia: Diagnostics for Behavioral Professionals' (DDBP protocol; Van Luit et al., 2014), describes how behavioral experts can examine whether a student has developmental dyscalculia (DD), based on three criteria: severity, discrepancy, and resistance. In addition to distinguishing the criteria necessary for diagnosis, the protocol provides guidance on formulating hypotheses by describing and operationalising four possible associative cognitive factors of math problems: , and The current exploratory and descriptive research aims to describe the frequency of these four primary associative cognitive factors in students with DD from the Netherlands.

Counting and Number Line Trainings in Kindergarten: Effects on Arithmetic Performance and Number Sense.

Children's early numerical capacities form the building blocks for later arithmetic proficiency. Linear number placements and counting skills are indicative of mapping, as an important precursor to arithmetic skills, and have been suggested to be of vital importance to arithmetic development. The current study investigated whether fostering mapping skills is more efficient through a counting or a number line training program.

Cognitive predictors of children's development in mathematics achievement: A latent growth modeling approach.

Research has identified various domain-general and domain-specific cognitive abilities as predictors of children's individual differences in mathematics achievement. However, research into the predictors of children's individual growth rates, namely between-person differences in within-person change in mathematics achievement is scarce. We assessed 334 children's domain-general and mathematics-specific early cognitive abilities and their general mathematics achievement longitudinally across four time-points within the first and second grades of primary school.

Visual working memory and number sense: Testing the double deficit hypothesis in mathematics.

Background: Evidence exists that there are two main underlying cognitive factors in mathematical difficulties: working memory and number sense. It is suggested that real math difficulties appear when both working memory and number sense are weak, here referred to as the double deficit (DD) hypothesis.

Aims: The aim of this study was to test the DD hypothesis within a longitudinal time span of 2 years.

Remedial early numeracy education: can children identified as having a language deficiency benefit?

Background: Growing attention has been paid to the possibility of supporting early numeracy in at-risk kindergartners. Furthermore, it is assumed that language proficiency is an important prerequisite in early maths skills.

Aims: To examine whether remedial early numeracy education in kindergarten, which has been proven to be effective in general, is also beneficial for children with a language deficiency.

The Monkey game: A computerized verbal working memory task for self-reliant administration in primary school children.

In two studies, the psychometric properties of an online self-reliant verbal working memory task (the Monkey game) for primary school children (6-12 years of age) were examined. In Study 1, children (n = 5,203) from 31 primary schools participated. The participants completed computerized verbal and visual-spatial working memory tasks (i.

Longitudinal development of number line estimation and mathematics performance in primary school children.

Children's ability to relate number to a continuous quantity abstraction visualized as a number line is widely accepted to be predictive of mathematics achievement. However, a debate has emerged with respect to how children's placements are distributed on this number line across development. In the current study, different models were applied to children's longitudinal number placement data to get more insight into the development of number line representations in kindergarten and early primary school years.

Verbal and visual-spatial working memory and mathematical ability in different domains throughout primary school.

The relative importance of visual-spatial and verbal working memory for mathematics performance and learning seems to vary with age, the novelty of the material, and the specific math domain that is investigated. In this study, the relations between verbal and visual-spatial working memory and performance in four math domains (i.e.

Explaining numeracy development in weak performing kindergartners.

Gaining better insight into precursors of early numeracy in young children is important, especially in those with inadequate numeracy skills. Therefore, in the current study, visual and verbal working memory, non-symbolic and symbolic comparison skills, and specific math-related language were used to explain early numeracy performance and development of weak performing children throughout kindergarten. The early numeracy ability of both weak performers and typical performers was measured at four time points during 2 years of kindergarten to compare growth rates.

Validity and reliability of an online visual-spatial working memory task for self-reliant administration in school-aged children.

Working memory is an important predictor of academic performance, and of math performance in particular. Most working memory tasks depend on one-to-one administration by a testing assistant, which makes the use of such tasks in large-scale studies time-consuming and costly. Therefore, an online, self-reliant visual-spatial working memory task (the Lion game) was developed for primary school children (6-12 years of age).

Accelerating the early numeracy development of kindergartners with limited working memory skills through remedial education.

Background: Young children with limited working memory skills are a special interest group among all children that score below average on early numeracy tests. This study examines the effect of accelerating the early numeracy development of these children through remedial education, by comparing them with children with typically working memory skills and early numeracy abilities below average.

Method: Selected from a sample of 933 children, children with early numeracy ability below average are assigned into four groups: two intervention groups with limited working memory skills (IL-group) or typical working memory skills (IT-group), and two control groups with limited working memory skills (CL-group) or typical working memory skills (CT-group).

Longitudinal study of low and high achievers in early mathematics.

Background: Longitudinal studies allow us to identify, which specific maths skills are weak in young children, and whether there is a continuing weakness in these areas throughout their school years.

Aims: This 2-year study investigated whether certain socio-demographic variables affect early mathematical competency in children aged 5-7 years.

Sample: A randomly selected sample of 127 students (64 female; 63 male) participated.

The effectiveness of Korean number naming on insight into numbers in Dutch students with mild intellectual disabilities.

Background: Children from Asian countries score higher on early years' arithmetic tests than children from Europe or the United States of America. An explanation for these differences may be the way numbers are named. A clear ten-structure like in the Korean language method leads to a better insight into numbers and arithmetic skills.

The effectiveness of Korean number naming on insight into numbers in Dutch students with mild intellectual disabilities.

Children from Asian countries score higher on early years' arithmetic tests than children from Europe or the United States of America. An explanation for these differences may be the way numbers are named. A clear ten-structure like in the Korean language method leads to a better insight into numbers and arithmetic skills.

Executive functions as predictors of math learning disabilities.

In the past years, an increasing number of studies have investigated executive functions as predictors of individual differences in mathematical abilities. The present longitudinal study was designed to investigate whether the executive functions shifting, inhibition, and working memory differ between low achieving and typically achieving children and whether these executive functions can be seen as precursors to math learning disabilities in children. Furthermore, the predictive value of working memory ability compared to preparatory mathematical abilities was examined.

Memory profiles in children with mild intellectual disabilities: strengths and weaknesses.

Strengths and weaknesses in short-term memory (STM) and working memory (WM) were identified in children with mild intellectual disabilities (MID) by comparing their performance to typically developing children matched on chronological age (CA children) and to younger typically developing children with similar mental capacities (MA children). Children with MID performed less well on all measures compared to the CA children. Relative to the MA children, especially verbal WM was weak.

The Early Numeracy Test in Finnish: children's norms.

This article concerns psychometric aspects of the Finnish Early Numeracy Test, which has been translated from the original Dutch Early Numeracy Test. The advantage of the test is that young children's numerical skills can be assessed systematically, which was not possible previously in Finland. A norm study was conducted in which the test was administered to a representative sample of 1,029 Finnish children.

Utility of the PASS theory and cognitive assessment system for Dutch children with and without ADHD.

This study examined the utility of the Planning, Attention, Simultaneous, Successive (PASS) theory of intelligence as measured by the Cognitive Assessment System (CAS) for evaluation of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The CAS scores of 51 Dutch children without ADHD were compared to the scores of a group of 20 Dutch children with ADHD. The scores of the Dutch children were also compared to American standardization samples of children with and without ADHD.

Mathematical learning difficulties and PASS cognitive processes.

This study examined the relationships between mathematical learning difficulties (MLD) and the planning, attention, simultaneous, successive (PASS) theory of cognitive processing. The Cognitive Assessment System (CAS) was used to measure the PASS processes for a group of 267 Dutch students with MLD who attended either general or special education. The results showed that students with MLD performed lower than their peers on all CAS scales and that the MLD group contained many students with cognitive weaknesses in planning or successive processing.