14 DAY TRIAL // Researchers have recently discovered that babies even a few hours old have the ability to understand abstract concepts such as numbers, a trait that may finally prove the claim that it is innate, and not acquired over the course of a lifetime. In their study, the scientists identified numerical thought as the ability that the children had to relate to numbers in themselves, and not as referring to other things.
In order to demonstrate their idea, the experts used a fairly simple process, which basically relied on seeing if the test subjects were able to relate the same number of objects to the same number of sounds, irrespective of the type of sounds or the objects themselves. If the newborns proved to be able to master this challenge, then it meant that they had had this trait since the first hours of their lives, not due to school or education.
Harvard University expert Véronique Izard led a team of colleagues in conducting an investigation on 16 small infants, aged seven to 100 hours. They were made to hear a two-minute tape, featuring spoken syllable constructs such as “ra ra ra ra me me me me,” NewScientist reports. Afterwards, with the tape still playing in the background, the researchers showed them images of geometric shapes and other pictures, which had the same number of components as the syllables in each construct.
The study revealed that babies, regardless of their age, looked at the correct images for a longer time. In this instance, 15 out of 16 were able to correctly identify the images that made more sense when correlated to the sounds. “This is telling us that babies, within a couple of hours after they are born, have a very abstract representation of numbers that applies similarly to visual and audio stimuli,” Izard said of the results.
More than 50 children were originally involved in the study, but the researchers could not use data from the others because they were uncooperative, falling asleep, or requiring constant supervision. Still, the researchers think, the data collected from the 16 cooperative participants is enough to argue in favor of their idea.