The influence of language on the formation of number concepts; Evidence from pre-school children who are bilingual in English and Arabic

This study examined the role of language on early number concepts from the perspective of bilingualism. Arabic/English bilinguals were studied since the Arabic language provides a distinctive linguistic context for the learner through its system of nominal number marking. Arabic is unusual in distinguishing between singular, dual and plural nouns. When a noun appears in dual form it is interpreted as referring to precisely two entities. Research suggests that exposure to dual case provides accelerated access to the concept of two. We asked whether early number knowledge in general is influenced by such exposure, and further examined the extent to which such influence is either (a) limited to number knowledge as expressed in the Arabic language, or (b) extended to include number knowledge as expressed in the English language. Furthermore, we examined the relationship between transcoding and number knowledge. A sample of 77 Arabic/English bilingual children was recruited. Arabic and English language skills, knowledge of the spoken number sequence in Arabic and English and comprehension of dual case nominal number marking in Arabic were assessed. Early number concepts were assessed in Arabic and English languages through cardinality and number identification testing, employing a widely used procedure and including comparison of the range of scoring systems represented in the literature. Convergent results from logistic and linear regression analyses demonstrated that number concepts assessed in Arabic, but not English, showed significant independent influence of dual case comprehension, indicating linguistic specificity of early number concepts. However, extended statistical models showed significant further influence of English concepts of Arabic concepts and vice versa. Furthermore, cardinality concepts played an important role in transcoding skills in both languages. However, the pattern of mutual transfer of cardinality concepts between languages was not found for transcoding skills. Our findings indicate that very early number concepts, developed within a specific set of linguistic contexts, may be represented at an abstract level, capable of transfer across languages