Exploring the structure of mental representation in fraction

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 16K13472
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Educational psychology
• Research Institution: Osaka Prefecture University
• Principal Investigator: Okamoto Masahiko 大阪府立大学, 人間社会システム科学研究科, 教授 (40254445)
• Co-Investigator(Renkei-kenkyūsha): TANIDA Yuki 大阪大学, 連合小児発達学研究科, 特任助教 (80800218)
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 分数表象 / 基準分数 / 量の類似性効果

Outline of Final Research Achievements

A cognitive process of fraction is important topics in the domain of numerical development and mathematics education. But it was not had been clarified yet. The purpose of this study was to examine the mental representation of fraction for matured adult.
We used the immediate serial recall task to access one’s mental representation of fraction. A magnitude similarity effect in immediate serial recall task was obtained in the results from Study 1, 2 and 3. Those results suggested that a metal representation of fraction was also represented on the basis of magnitude information as same as whole number in our mind. But the relationship between magnitude similarity effect and performance in typical numerical tasks, magnitude decision and number line estimation, was inconsistent in our results. Those result suggested that a cognitive process of fraction was task specific. And the results from Study 4 and 5 with number line estimation task suggested common fraction were 1/2 and 1/3.

Free Research Field

教育心理学　認知心理学　発達心理学