TY - JOUR
T1 - Bringing brain imaging to the school to assess arithmetic problem solving
T2 - Chances and limitations in combining educational and neuroscientific research
AU - Obersteiner, Andreas
AU - Dresler, Thomas
AU - Reiss, Kristina
AU - Vogel, A. Carina M.
AU - Pekrun, Reinhard
AU - Fallgatter, Andreas J.
N1 - Funding Information:
Acknowledgments The authors wish to thank the teachers, staff and students of the participating schools, and the student assistants for their contribution to this study. Our special thanks go to Harald Zauner for programming the behavioral study. Furthermore, we would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. We are grateful for the ETG 4000 NIRS equipment provided by Hitachi Medical Corp. The study was financed by the research grant 01GJ0616/01GJ0617 from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research to K.R., A.J.F., and R.P.
PY - 2010
Y1 - 2010
N2 - Scientific collaboration between neuroscience and mathematics education has mostly focused on brain imaging trying to inform education. This study aims at meeting expectations of both research fields, thus enhancing the ecological validity. We investigated the influence of age, mathematical competency, and task characteristics (format, complexity) on students' arithmetic performance. Based on behavioral data from a pilot study (n = 73), arithmetic tasks were chosen for a subsequent investigation (n = 90), in which parietal brain activation was measured with near-infrared spectroscopy. Substantial group differences in calculation time were observed. While task characteristics influenced arithmetic performance in both age groups, this influence was much smaller for grade 8 students. However, parietal brain activation during calculation was not affected by age, mathematical competency, or task characteristics. Limitations of the experimental design and general problems of applying imaging methods to the school context are discussed.
AB - Scientific collaboration between neuroscience and mathematics education has mostly focused on brain imaging trying to inform education. This study aims at meeting expectations of both research fields, thus enhancing the ecological validity. We investigated the influence of age, mathematical competency, and task characteristics (format, complexity) on students' arithmetic performance. Based on behavioral data from a pilot study (n = 73), arithmetic tasks were chosen for a subsequent investigation (n = 90), in which parietal brain activation was measured with near-infrared spectroscopy. Substantial group differences in calculation time were observed. While task characteristics influenced arithmetic performance in both age groups, this influence was much smaller for grade 8 students. However, parietal brain activation during calculation was not affected by age, mathematical competency, or task characteristics. Limitations of the experimental design and general problems of applying imaging methods to the school context are discussed.
KW - Arithmetic
KW - Competency
KW - NIRS
KW - Neuroimaging
KW - Neuroscience
KW - Task characteristics
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=81255154931&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s11858-010-0256-7
DO - 10.1007/s11858-010-0256-7
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:81255154931
SN - 1863-9690
VL - 42
SP - 541
EP - 554
JO - ZDM - Mathematics Education
JF - ZDM - Mathematics Education
IS - 6
ER -