Why preschoolers are reluctant to count spontaneously

Two experiments are reported which examine children's counting and its role in reasoning about the relative numerosity of two arrays. In the first experiment, children's number judgements were compared under different conditions designed to evaluate the importance of three different cues to number—length and density of rows, small number perception and counting. Children were found to count very rarely unless specifically asked to do so. Experiment 2 investigated some possible reasons why children who count readily in some situations are reluctant to count spontaneously in this number judgement task. Spontaneous counting in 4-year-olds increased in one condition only: when they were given feedback as to the correctness of their previous judgements. This feedback showed that basing judgements on number as counted was always correct whereas length and density judgements were only sometimes correct. Preschoolers' preference for length as a cue to number may therefore be due to their belief that length is a more reliable cue than counting, rather than to their ignorance about the link between counting and numerical reasoning.