AUTHOR=Domahs Frank , Klein Elise , Moeller Korbinian , Nuerk Hans-Christoph , Yoon Byung-Chen , Willmes Klaus TITLE=Multimodal Semantic Quantity Representations: Further Evidence from Korean Sign Language JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology VOLUME=2 YEAR=2012 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00389 DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00389 ISSN=1664-1078 ABSTRACT=

Korean deaf signers performed a number comparison task on pairs of Arabic digits. In their response times profiles, the expected magnitude effect was systematically modified by properties of number signs in Korean sign language in a culture-specific way (not observed in hearing and deaf Germans or hearing Chinese). We conclude that finger-based quantity representations are automatically activated even in simple tasks with symbolic input although this may be irrelevant and even detrimental for task performance. These finger-based numerical representations are accessed in addition to another, more basic quantity system which is evidenced by the magnitude effect. In sum, these results are inconsistent with models assuming only one single amodal representation of numerical quantity.