Abstract
This study compared the spatial representation of numbers in three groups of adults: Canadians, who read both English words and Arabic numbers from left to right; Palestinians, who read Arabic words and Arabic-Indic numbers from right to left; and Israelis, who read Hebrew words from right to left but Arabic numbers from left to right. Canadians associated small numbers with left and large numbers with right space (the SNARC effect), Palestinians showed the reverse association, and Israelis had no reliable spatial association for numbers. These results suggest that reading habits for both words and numbers contribute to the spatial representation of numbers.
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The work was supported in part by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Individual Discovery Grant to W.M.P. M.H.F. is a member of the Marie Curie Research and Training Network: Language and Brain (www.hull.ac.uk/RTN-LAB/). His work is funded by the European Commission (MRTN-CT-2004-512141 and ECRPRES-000-23-1388) as part of its Sixth Framework Program.
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Shaki, S., Fischer, M.H. & Petrusic, W.M. Reading habits for both words and numbers contribute to the SNARC effect. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 16, 328–331 (2009). https://doi.org/10.3758/PBR.16.2.328
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/PBR.16.2.328