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I just read this paper (it took me a while to get it) and it does not make any reference to fractions at all. It only supports the first claim: >That differenc

I just read this paper (it took me a while to get it) and it does not make any reference to fractions at all. It only supports the first claim: >That difference means that Asian children learn to count much faster. Four year old Chinese children can count, on average, up to forty. American children... It does not support the second claim: >The regularity of their number systems also means that Asian children can perform basic functions—like addition—far more easily... I don't have a copy of the book to hand (in India and haven't managed to find it yet) - I can only see the online excerpt. Does he cite other papers in support of the fractions claim and/or the second claim quoted above?

Alex3917 18y ago
He only cites secondary sources in the book. I just linked to that paper because I happened to know about it offhand. (Wrote a couple papers about it in college.) If you want to find the paper supporting the second claim, Gladwell explicitly uses the keyword number-naming systems so that is a pretty big clue. There can only be so many cognitive development papers with that as the independent variable, so it should be pretty easy to find. It wouldn't surprise me if the research supporting the second claim was done by the same researchers who did the other paper I linked to.
- tomsaffell 18y ago
  Thanks Alex. I guess I'll wait until I can get my hands on the book to find out what sources he is citing.