Baby Chicks Think Left For Lower Numbers, Right for Higher Like Humans
- 9 years ago
New research has shown that baby chicks think left when considering lower numbers and right when addressing higher numbers, indicating that the mental number line also practiced by humans may be innate instead of learned.
Baby chicks may have the innate mental disposition to relate lower numbers with the left-hand side and higher numbers with the right-- just as many humans do.
Scientists have termed this linear orientation of numbers the “mental number line,” and the research, led by a psychologist previously at the University of Padova in Italy, could prove that it is a hard-wired brain function, as opposed to culturally learned as some have suggested.
In the study, three-day old chicks were trained to retrieve meal worms placed behind a small panel that displayed five red squares.
In subsequent tests, two panels, both showing the same number of shapes, were placed in front of the chick.
Approximately seventy percent of the time, the baby birds went to the panel on the left i
Baby chicks may have the innate mental disposition to relate lower numbers with the left-hand side and higher numbers with the right-- just as many humans do.
Scientists have termed this linear orientation of numbers the “mental number line,” and the research, led by a psychologist previously at the University of Padova in Italy, could prove that it is a hard-wired brain function, as opposed to culturally learned as some have suggested.
In the study, three-day old chicks were trained to retrieve meal worms placed behind a small panel that displayed five red squares.
In subsequent tests, two panels, both showing the same number of shapes, were placed in front of the chick.
Approximately seventy percent of the time, the baby birds went to the panel on the left i