Impaired Acuity of the Approximate Number System Underlies Mathematical Learning Disability (Dyscalculia)

TLDR

Many children experience significant mathematical learning disabilities despite adequate schooling. The study tests whether deficits in the Approximate Number System underlie mathematical learning disability. Students with MLD show markedly lower ANS precision than low, typical, and high‑achieving peers, a deficit that persists after controlling for domain‑general abilities and is not seen in low‑achieving students, indicating an ANS impairment specific to MLD.

Abstract

Many children have significant mathematical learning disabilities (MLD, or dyscalculia) despite adequate schooling. The current study hypothesizes that MLD partly results from a deficiency in the Approximate Number System (ANS) that supports nonverbal numerical representations across species and throughout development. In this study of 71 ninth graders, it is shown that students with MLD have significantly poorer ANS precision than students in all other mathematics achievement groups (low, typically, and high achieving), as measured by psychophysical assessments of ANS acuity (w) and of the mappings between ANS representations and number words (cv). This relation persists even when controlling for domain-general abilities. Furthermore, this ANS precision does not differentiate low-achieving from typically achieving students, suggesting an ANS deficit that is specific to MLD.