Abstract
Previous research has found that domain-general cognitive abilities, especially working memory and visual selective attention, play crucial roles in primary children’s mathematical performance, while little is known about their roles in basic number processing in kindergarten children at earlier years. The current study investigated whether working memory components and visual selective attention would make significant contributions to children’s basic number processing. A total of 110 Chinese children (M ± SD = 6.28 ± 0.41 years old) were examined with the phonological loop, the visuospatial sketchpad, the central executive, visual selective attention and three number processing tasks (i.e., numerosity estimation, number line estimation and numerical magnitude comparison tasks). Results revealed that the phonological loop accounted for unique variance in children’s performance on numerosity estimation, number line estimation, and numerical magnitude comparison. Both the visuospatial sketchpad and the central executive significantly contributed to numerical magnitude comparison, whereas visual selective attention explained unique variance in children’s performance of numerosity estimation and number line estimation. Our findings suggest that three components of working memory and visual selective attention have differentiated associations with varied basic number processing skills.