Infant research is providing accumulating evidence that number-space mappings appear early in development. Here, a Posner cueing paradigm was used to investigate the neural mechanisms underpinning the attentional bias induced by nonsymbolic numerical cues in 9-month-old infants (N = 32). Event-related potentials and saccadic reaction time were…

Concludes that children, as well as adults, are able to expand or contract the breadth of their attentional focus in accordance with task demands. Suggests there is a developmental change in the efficiency with which a stimulus presented in an otherwise empty field can be located. (Author/RH)