Ordinal knowledge: number names and number concepts in Chinese and English.

Previous research has demonstrated cross-language variation in early counting associated with linguistic differences in number-naming systems. Ordinal number names are typically learned later than cardinal names, but languages also differ in the regularity with which they form these names. Elementary school children in China and the U.S. showed differences in the acquisition and use of ordinal numbers corresponding to linguistic differences in ordinal names in their native languages. On tasks assessing children's conceptual knowledge of ordinal relations, a more complicated picture emerged. These results suggest that (a) children induce their language's set of ordinal number names by generalization based on rules sanctioned by early examples, and (b) the relation between ordinal names and ordinal concepts is a complex one, with language only one source of difficulty in understanding ordinal relations. Implications for studies of the relation between linguistic structure and cognitive development are discussed, in particular the possibility that effects of linguistic differences may vary for different levels of development and for different aspects of cognition.