Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-42gr6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T01:41:13.027Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Number Processing Dissociations: Evidence from a Case of Dyscalculia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 April 2014

Fernando Cuetos  and
Graciela Miera
Fernando Cuetos*
Affiliation:
University of Oviedo
Graciela Miera
Affiliation:
University of Oviedo
*
*Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Dr. Fernando Cuetos, Departamento de Psicología.Universidad de Oviedo. Plaza Feijoo, s/n. 33003 – Oviedo (Spain).
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In this case study of an aphasic patient with difficulties in numerical processing, the patient responded to a series of linguistic and numerical tasks designed to assess efficiency levels in processing various linguistic components. In addition, the patient completed a series of transcoding tasks that were directed at isolating whether the problems were associated primarily with arabic numerals or with other modalities (spoken or written). Data were analyzed using chi-square goodness-of-fit tests. Statistically significant differences were obtained between spoken verbal and written verbal outputs and between arabic and spoken verbal outputs. Based upon an analysis of errors, it was tentatively concluded that the disorders were associated with two types of dissociation operating together, one between spoken verbal and written verbal outputs at the syntactical level and the other between lexical and syntactical components in the spoken verbal output. A revised model is proposed to provide a tentative explanation for these observations.

Los estudios realizados en los últimos años con pacientes discalcúlicos están sirviendo para comprobar, por una parte, cómo funcionan los módulos que componen el sistema de procesamiento numérico, y, por otra, la relación que existe entre procesamiento numérico y procesamiento lingüístico en general. En este artículo presentamos un paciente con dificultades en el procesamiento numérico al que se le pasaron varias tareas lingüísticas y numéricas destinadas a comprobar si sus problemas eran sólo numéricos o afectaban también a otras modalidades verbales. Las diferencias estadísticamente significativas (contrastadas mediante chi-cuadrado) entre producción verbal y escrita y entre producción verbal y arábiga y los tipos de errores que comete manifiestan la existencia de dos importantes disociaciones: una en producción arábiga entre los procesos léxico y sintáctico, y otra entre producción verbal y escrita a nivel léxico. Puesto que los modelos existentes no contemplan estas disociaciones, se propone un nuevo modelo derivado de los anteriores.

Keywords

dyscalculianumeral processingarabic numeral systemdiscalculiaprocesamiento numéricosistema numeral arábigo
Type
Articles
Information
The Spanish Journal of Psychology , Volume 1 , May 1998 , pp. 18 - 31
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1998

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, S.W., Damasio, A.R., & Damasio, H. (1990). Troubled letters but not numbers. Brain, 113, 749–766.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benson, D.F., & Denckla, M.B. (1969). Verbal paraphasia as a cause of calculation disturbances. Archives of Neurology, 21, 96–102.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caramazza, A., & McCloskey, M. (1994). Number system processing: Evidence from dyscalculia. In Cohen, N., Schwartz, M., & Moscovitch, M. (Eds.), Advances in Cognitive Neuropsychology. New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Cipolotti, L. (1995). Multiple routes for reading words, why not numbers? Evidence from a case of arabic numeral dyslexia. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 12, 313–342.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cipolotti, L., & Butterworth, B. (1995). Toward a multiroute model of number processing: Impaired number transcoding with preserved calculationskills. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 124, 375–390.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cipolotti, L., Butterworth, B., & Denes, G. (1991). A specific deficit for numbers in case of dense acalculia. Brain, 114, 2619–2637CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cipolotti, L., Butterworth, B., & Warrington, E.K. (1994). From “one thousand nine hundred and forty-five” to 1000,945. Neurospychologia, 32, 503–509.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cohen, L., Dehaene, S., & Verstichel, P. (1994). Number words and number non-words. A case of deep dyslexia extending to arabic numerals. Brain, 117, 267–279.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dehaene, S. (1992). Varieties of numerical abilities. Cognition, 44, 1–42.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dehaene, S., & Cohen, L. (1995). Towards an anatomical and functional model of number processing. Mathematical Cognition, 1, 83–120.Google Scholar
Deloche, G., & Seron, X. (1982). From Three to 3: A differential analysis of skills in transcoding quantities between patients with Broca's and Wernicke's aphasia. Brain, 105, 719–733.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Deloche, G., & Seron, X. (1987). Numerical transcoding: A general production model. In Deloche, G. & Seron, X. (Eds.), Mathematical disabilities: A cognitive neuropsychological perspective. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Ellis, A.W. (1982). Spelling and writing (and reading and speaking). In Ellis, A.W. (Ed.), Normality and pathology in cognitive functions. London: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Macaruso, P., McCloskey, M., & Aliminosa, D. (1993). The functional architecture of the cognitive numerical processing system: Evidence from a patient with multiple impairments. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 10, 341–376.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCloskey, M. (1992). Cognitive mechanisms in numerical processing: Evidence from acquired dyscalculia. Cognition, 44, 107–157.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McCloskey, M., & Caramazza, A. (1987). Cognitive mechanisms in normal and impaired number processing. In Deloche, G. & Seron, X. (Eds.), Mathematical disabilities: A cognitive neuropsychological perspective. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
McCloskey, M., Caramazza, A., & Basili, A. (1985).Cognitive mechanisms in number processing and calculation: Evidence from dyscalculia. Brain and Cognition, 4, 171–196.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McCloskey, M., Caramazza, A., & Goodman-Schulman, R.A. (1990). Cognitive representations and processes in number production: Evidence from cases of acquired dyscalculia. In Caramazza, A. (Ed.), Cognitive Neuropsychology and Neurolinguistics. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
McCloskey, M., Sokol, S.M., & Goodman, R.A. (1986). Cognitive processes in verbal-number production: Inferences from the performance of brain-damaged subjects. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 115, 307–330.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nöel, M.P., & Seron, X. (1993). Arabic number reading deficit: a single case study or when 236 is read (2306) and judged superior to 1258. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 10, 317–339.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nöel, M.P., & Seron, X. (1995). Lexicalization errors in writing arabic numerals: a single-case study. Brain and Cognition, 29, 151–179.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rossor, M.N., Warrington, E.K., & Cipolotti, L. (1995). The isolation of calculation skills. Journal of Neurology, 242, 78–81.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Seron, X., & Deloche, G. (1983). From 4 to four: a supplement to ‘From three to 3’. Brain, 106, 735–744.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Seron, X., & Deloche, M.P. (1987). The production of counting sequences by aphasics and children: A matter of lexical rocessing? In Deloche, G. & Seron, X. (Eds.), Mathematical disabilities: A Cognitive Neuropsychological perspective. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Seron, X., & Nöel, M.P. (1992). Language and numerical disorders: A neuropsychological approach. In Alegria, J., Holender, D., Morais, J., & Radeau, M.. (Eds), Analytic Approaches to Human Cognition. North-Holland: Elsevier Science Publishers B.V.Google Scholar
Seron, X., & Nöel, M.P. (1995). Transcoding numbers from the arabic code to the verbal one or vice versa: How many routes? Mathematical Cognition, 1, 215–243.Google Scholar
Singer, H.D., & Low, A.A. (1933). Acalculia: A clinical study. Archives of Neurology and Psychiatry, 29, 467–498.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sokol, S., & McCloskey, M. (1988). Levels of representation in verbal number production. Applied Psycholinguistics, 9, 267–281.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Valle, F., & Cuetos, F. (1995). EPLA: Evaluacion del Procesamiento Linguistico en la Afasia. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar