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Are numbers logographs?
Author(s) -
Green David,
Meara Paul,
Court Stephen
Publication year - 1989
Publication title -
journal of research in reading
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.077
H-Index - 51
eISSN - 1467-9817
pISSN - 0141-0423
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9817.1989.tb00302.x
Subject(s) - numeral system , set (abstract data type) , task (project management) , homogeneous , psychology , natural language processing , process (computing) , linguistics , computer science , artificial intelligence , arithmetic , cognitive psychology , mathematics , combinatorics , philosophy , management , economics , programming language , operating system
Researchers generally assume that logographs such as numerals form a homogeneous set. This paper presents a study whose results challenge that assumption. Using a visual search task, it is shown that native Chinese speakers, who can read and speak English, process strings of Chinese numerals differently from the way they process strings of Western numerals. The different pattern of results found with these two sets of numerals also contrasts with the pattern typically found when native English speakers process Western numerals. An explanation of this result is proposed based on the notion that visual search functions can be the outcome of the combined effect of different basic search procedures.