DEVELOPMENTAL REVIEW 2,213-236 (1982)

The Development of Mental Arithmetic:

A Chronometric Approach
MARK H. ASHCRAFT

Cleveland State University

The development of mental arithmetic is approached from a mathematical

perspective, focusing on several process models of arithmetic performance which
have grown out of the chronometric methods of cognitive psychology. These
models, based on hypotheses about the nature of underlying mental operations
and structures in arithmetic, generate quantitative predictions about reaction time
performance. A review of the research suggests a developmental trend in the
mastery of arithmetic knowledge-there is an initial reliance on procedural knowl-
edge and methods such as counting which is followed by a gradual shift to retrieval
from a network representation of arithmetic facts. A descriptive model of these
mental structures and processes is presented, and quantitative predictions about
children’s arithmetic performance at various stages of mastery are considered.

The topic of this paper is children’s mental arithmetic, specifically chil-

dren’s performance on the “whole number facts” which figure promi-
nently in the early elementary school curriculum. We are interested in the
question of how a mathematical operation, simple addition for example, is
performed mentally, how the underlying basis for this performance
changes across development, and how the issues of performance and
change might be distilled into a theory of arithmetic development. The
importance of these questions is self-evident. Arithmetic is a major com-
ponent of all elementary school curricula, and it provides the child with
the necessary skills for later mathematics and science education. It is no
less true that arithmetic, and mathematics in general, is often a trou-
blesome component of education, with unfortunate academic and practi-
cal consequences. To pick merely one startling example, Capon and
Kuhn’s (1979) test of supermarket shoppers revealed that fewer than a
third could use a proportional reasoning strategy, with a simple 2:3 ratio,
to determine which of two items was the better buy.
Interest in arithmetic and mathematics is, of course, not new in psy-
chology; performance on the number facts, for example, was a central
concern to investigators early in this century (for example, Clapp (1924)

Preparation of this paper was partially supported by National Science Foundation Grant
SED-8021521. The cooperation of the Cleveland Heights-University Heights and
Lakewood, Ohio, school districts in the conduct of our research is gratefully acknowledged.
Address reprint requests to the author, Department of Psychology, Cleveland State Univer-
sity, Cleveland, OH 44115.

213
0273-2297/82/030213-24$02.00/O
Copyright J] 1982 by Academic Pres,. Inc.
All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.
214 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

and Wheeler (1939) both cited in Resnick & Ford (1981)). More recent
investigations differ from these older studies not only in their techniques,
but also in their theoretical approach. The past 30 years has seen the
development of a new “paradigm” in psychology, in the Kuhnian (1962)
sense of the word. Our pretheoretical assumptions, methodologies, typi-
cal modes of theorizing, and so on have changed radically from the earlier
neobehaviorist tradition. What has emerged is a psychology of cognition,
a paradigm which relies heavily on time-based, that is to say, “chronomet-
ric,” methods for its models and theories (see Lachman, Lachman, &
Butterfield (1979) for complete treatment of these developments). The
models of arithmetic performance which are reviewed represent this
chronometric tradition in cognitive psychology and reflect mathematically
derived analyses of arithmetic performance.
A few preparatory remarks about the chronometric approach may be
appropriate here. For the most part, chronometric models of arithmetic
are not the probabilistic theories typical of more traditional mathematical
modeling (but see, for example, Brainerd, Note 1). Instead, chronometric
models of arithmetic commonly hypothesize a set of mental processes or
stages, and make quantitatively different predictions about the time-
related characteristics of the stages, hence the name “chronometric.”
Thus, one model may predict linear performance functions, with particu-
lar slope and intercept parameters (e.g., Groen & Parkman, 1972), whereas
another model may predict a nonlinear function, different parameters,
and/or specific effects not provided for by the first model (e.g., Ashcraft
& Stazyk, 1981). Statistical tests of the competing models proceed by
comparing the fit of the data to the alternative sets of predictions. The
tendency to favor multiple regression analysis for this purpose relates to
the usefulness of the technique for parameter estimation of slopes and
intercepts, and for simultaneous consideration of the predictive accuracy
of different models and variables.
Our review begins with an introduction to the assumptions and
chronometric methods that characterize many of the current theories in
cognitive psychology. The discussion then turns to Sternberg’s (1966,
1969) influential “additive factors” method of analysis; since several ex-
cellent reviews of these topics are available (e.g., Chase, 1978; Lachman
et al., 1979; Pachella, 1974), our discussion of them is somewhat ab-
breviated. The several chronometric models of mental arithmetic which
have been derived from such methods are then presented, along with the
supporting research, to indicate the fruitfulness of this approach, and to
summarize the available information concerning children’s arithmetic
skills and processes. A consideration of data from older children and from
adults is followed by a descriptive model of the development of mental
arithmetic processing. In keeping with the theme of this special issue,
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 215

relatively little attention is paid to the more qualitative research on chil-

dren’s number concepts and development: several comprehensive re-
views of these topics are available, however (e.g., Resnick & Ford, 1981:
Gellman & Gallistel, 1978).
CHRONOMETRIC ANALYSES OF MENTAL PROCESSES
Two of the most central assumptions in cognitive psychology concern
time and thus motivate the use of a label like “chronometric.” The first
and most basic assumption is simply that mental processes take a measur-
able amount of time. While this may seem to be a trivially obvious as-
sumption, notice that it contradicts common intuition in a rather subtle
fashion. We are typically only dimly aware, if at all, of our own mental
processes as they occur, naively assuming that such everyday skills as
comprehending language or doing arithmetic are virtually instantaneous,
largely habitual, and of particular consequence only if they fail us. Such
intuitions are highly misleading, as an enormous amount of research has
shown. To take merely two examples, deciding that 1 is the smaller of the
set 1,2 is faster than deciding the converse, that 2 is the larger of 1,2
(Banks, Fujii, & Kayra-Stuart, 1976). More germane to the present topic,
adding 7 + 6 is significantly slower than adding 4 + 3, both for young
children and for highly practiced adults (Ashcraft & Battaglia, 1978;
Ashcraft & Fierman, 1982). Systematic time differences such as these
have suggested one of the major research paradigms in cognitive
psychology-the use of reaction time (RT) measures as a window through
which the normally unseen mental operations and processes of interest
can be viewed.
The second assumption, when added to the first, serves to define the
notion of chronometric analyses of cognitive performance. It is assumed
that the elapsed time between the presentation of a stimulus and the
subject’s response is a composite, reflecting the contributions of .sr\~rru/
srparmtr stagrs or operations which occur between presentation and re-
sponse. Since each hypothesized stage is thought to advance the sequence
of necessary operations one step closer to completion, the stages are
usually assumed to occur in fixed sequence and are often assumed to be
independent. While a logical analysis of the task leads to the initial
hypotheses about the stages necessary for performance, this is followed
by experimental manipulations designed to establish the reality of the
various stages.
There is an implicit assumption in the above statements which is worth
mentioning as well, because it often distinguishes chronometric investi-
gations from other styles of research. Given that any complex cognitive
skill is assumed to be built upon simpler components, an obvious research
strategy is to study the cognitive component in its simplified form. This is
216 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

merely to say that the chronometric methods are reductionistic and,

therefore, are more attuned to analytic theories of cognition than wholis-
tic theories. As an example of this reductionism, most models of arithme-
tic processing have been developed in the context of experiments with the
simple whole number facts, where time differences among the problems
lead to theoretical interpretations of mental operation. Studies of more
global differences may be informative; but their lack of the “micro-
analytic” features of the chronometric approach means that they are in-
capable of making fine-grained distinctions among different process
models .I
A particularly compelling translation of these assumptions into a
psychological model of mental processes is provided by the pioneering
work of Sternberg (1966, 1969, Note 2). Instead of investigating more
traditional questions about the capacity and duration of short-term mem-
ory, Sternberg was interested in the mental operations involved in
searching the contents of short-term memory. More specifically, he was
concerned with the nature of this memory search; was it a search that the
subject stopped when the target item was found, was it a search which
was influenced by the number of items that had to be scanned, was it a
one-by-one ordered search, and so forth.
To answer these questions, Sternberg proposed a modification of the
century-old “subtractive method,” developed by Donders (1868).
Sternberg’s improvement to the subtractive method (see especially
Chase, 1978) was to manipulate the number of times a single stage would
operate. Stated simply, if stage b in an “a, b, c, d” sequence is the one
which reflects the short-term memory search process, Sternberg pro-
posed that an experimental task be devised such that stage b would be
manipulated to occur once, twice, three times, etc. As such, the duration
of a single operation of stage b can be estimated by comparing RT’s when
the stage operates n times versus when it occurs 12 + 1 times. More gener-
ally, the duration is estimated by the slope of the time function when
plotted against the number of times (n) stage b has operated.
Figure 1 is illustrative of the task Sternberg used, the typically observed
results, and the process model which he proposed as an explanation.
Subjects were asked to store a short sequence of letters or numbers in

1 Of course, speed of responding is of secondary importance to accuracy in educational

contexts. The point here, however, is that accuracy is generally a less informative measure
of cognitive processing than speed (unless error rates are unusually high). Accuracy mea-
sures cannot provide the basis for discriminating among the hypothesized mental processes
under consideration here, say counting versus fact retrieval, except at the crudest of levels.
Furthermore, since subjects usually perform at better than a 95% accuracy level even in
speeded tasks (because of the simplicity of the stimuli), error rates in a nonspeeded condi-
tion would be virtually useless.
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 217

cy$Tfk;s, WITH
TRIAL
TYPE
1H MH
3M JTM YES -r I 0 1
1 2 3 4 5 6
4w QAE ‘NO
5s MHBR YES SIZE OF MEMORY SET (n,
STAGE MODEL

ENCODE PROBE LETTER MATCH/COMPARISON EXECUTE RESPONSE

RT = t ENCODE + t MATCH/COMPARISON + tDECISION + %ESPONSE

WHERE t MC- f(MEMORY SET SIZE)

ANDt, + t,+ tR = K(y - INTERCEPT)

FIG. 1. Sternberg’s short-term memory scanning task, typical results, and proposed stage
model. After Sternberg (1966, 1969).

short-term memory, and then were presented with a probe item. The task
simply required that subjects search the contents of short term memory to
determine whether the probe item was a member of the memory set or
not; instructions emphasized the necessity of being highly accurate as
well as rapid in responding.
Consider first the comparison (number l), when the letters M and H are
held in short-term memory, then scanned for the presence of H. Reaction
time on this trial type should be the time to encode the probe H (in other
words, perceive and mentally represent the H), the match or comparison
time for scanning two items in memory, the time to decide that a match
was found, and the time to execute the “yes” response. Of great impor-
tance is the comparison to trial type 3, in which the critical difference is
the one additional memory comparison necessitated by the additional
item held in memory. By comparing RT to trials of this nature, Sternberg
found that the extra memory comparison required an average of 38 msec;
that is to say, the slope of the RT function illustrated in the graph is 38
msec. Further, the RT curves for false comparisons (trial types 2 and 4)
did not differ in slope from those for true trials nor did the position of a
matching probe in the memory set affect RT's (trial type 5, for instance).
In other words, the same type of memory search was apparently occurring
on both true and false trials, regardless of the position of the match on true
trials. Since it is necessary to scan every position on false trials, in order
to maintain accuracy, the inference is that every position is scanned
exhaustively on all trials, true and false alike, with a yes/no decision being
made only after this thorough search is completed.
The process model proposed by Sternberg (1969) which incorporated
218 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

this serial exhaustive search is presented at the bottom of Fig. 1. The

model suggests that RT trials consist of four independent stages, each
adding some amount of time to the overall latency, and each advancing
the necessary operations by one step. After encoding of the probe, the
match/comparison stage searches short-term memory for the presence of
the probe letter. The subsequent decision stage evaluates the outcome of
this match process and is followed by execution of the appropriate re-
sponse. Of particular mathematical and theoretical significance in the
summary equation for RT is the fact that the encoding, decision, and
response stages occur only once during any trial and thus can be com-
bined into a single constant. The match/comparison stage, however, op-
erates a total of II times, n being the number of items held in memory.
Thus, the RT equation reduces to the more familiar form of RT = k + bn,
where k is a constant that corresponds to the y intercept of a regression
line, and b is the slope of the regression equation. It is the hallmark of this
approach that increases in RT across n can be attributed to the search/
comparison stage, with the value of b estimating the speed of the search.
A final aspect of Sternberg’s procedures involves the interpretation of
experimental results, essentially the method of inferring the existence of
stages based on statistically significant factors. A typical experiment
would manipulate the factors of memory set size and true vs false, as well
as others of interest. The investigator then examines the results for the
patterns of main effects and interactions among variables. Two variables
which do not interact significantly, such as memory set size and true/
false, are interpreted as having influenced separate stages of processing;
in this example, the match/comparison and decision stages, respectively.
In Sternberg’s terminology, these two variables are “additive
factors”-their effects are additive rather than interactive. In his original
reports, Sternberg found that a manipulation of intact vs degraded (fo-
cused vs blurred) probes did not interact with either set size or true/false.
Apparently, probe intactness affects a stage other than the match/
comparison and decision stages; logically, the locus of this effect is the
encoding stage of performance (Sternberg, 1966).
On the other hand, two variables which do interact significantly are
assumed to be affecting at least one shared stage. For example, Dugas and
Kellas (1974) tested normal and mentally retarded children in the short-
term scanning task, and found that the intellectual variable did interact
with memory set size. In other words, the intellectual variable affected at
least the same stage as set size, the match/comparison stage (and possibly
others as well). Retarded children were found to scan short-term memory
at a slower rate than children of normal intelligence, although the nature
of the search appeared to be the same for both, the serial exhaustive
search typical of adult performance.
While Sternberg’s “additive factors method” and its assumptions have
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 219

not gone unchallenged (e.g., McClelland, 1979; Pachella, 1974; Meyer &
Irwin, Note 3); it remains one of the most straightforward techniques for
discovering the nature and duration of mental processes. Areas of devel-
opmental research that have relied on this technique include age changes
in letter and word recognition (e.g., McFarland, Frey, & Landreth, 1978;
Samuels, LaBerge, & Bremer, 1978; Schwantes, 1981), complex sentence
processing (e.g., Townsend & Ravelo, 1980), inference processes (Danner
& Matthews, 1980), analogies (e.g., Sternberg & Nigro, 1980), and
semantic memory processes (e.g., McFarland & Kellas, 1975). In all of
these areas, the unifying theme is the use of time-based evidence about
mental operations.
CHRONOMETRIC MODELS OF SIMPLE ARITHMETIC
What mental operations and processes might be hypothesized in chil-
dren’s mental arithmetic? As it happens, there is substantial evidence that
preschool children rely extensively on counting. Ginsburg (1977), for
example, presented many transcripts of verbal protocols in which small
children are asked to deal with numerical relationships, including addi-
tion. A common strategy was a counting solution, e.g., “Vivian looked at
the twenty-five dot array and said, ‘twenty-five.’ Then she pointed to
each member of the fifteen dot array, and counted on, ‘twenty-six,
twenty-seven, . . . forty”’ (p. 124). Several theorists have charted the
stages of development of this rudimentary but obviously important skill.
For example, Gelman and Gallistel (1978) have analyzed counting per-
formance in terms of the various principles necessary for an accurate
count (for example, one-to-one correspondence, order invariance), and
have placed the development of these principles at the center of the
child’s developing understanding of number (see also Resnick & Ford,
1981; Steffe, Richards, & von Glasersfeld, 1979). It would appear then
that any model of children’s more formal knowledge of arithmetic must
deal with counting, and in fact must feature counting as a primary means
of calculation in young children.
In a seminal paper, Groen and Parkman (1972) described the develop-
ment and testing of several counting models of children’s addition per-
formance, models derived specifically from the chronometric approach
just outlined. Groen and Parkman considered only the simple addition
problems of the form m + 12, where m and n are positive single-digit
numbers, “addends” in addition, with a sum no more than 9 (the simple
whole number facts). Within this modest framework, five separate
counting models were generated, each hypothesizing somewhat different
mental operations, and each predicting a somewhat different set of RT
results. Figure 2 embeds their general counting assumptions in a standard
four-stage process model.
Note first in Fig. 2 that the counting or addition component of this
220 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

RT = ’ ENCODE * ~,cM,T, * Lx, + ~RESPONSE

‘COwlJTE - f(MINIMUM ADDEND)

WHERE
AND tE + t,+ tR * K (y - INTERCEPT)

FIG. 2. Groen and Parkman’s “count by min” model, embedded in a standard four-stage
processing model framework. After Groen and Parkman (1972).

model is analogous to Sternberg’s match/comparison stage in short-term

memory scanning. In other words, the stage responsible for computing
the answer to a problem, the counting stage, is the only repeatable stage in
the sequence. Each of the other components occurs only once on any
trial, while the count stage operates multiple times, depending on the
specifics of the counting algorithm. Just as the linear increase in RT in a
Sternberg task is attributable to the repeated operation of the match/
comparison stage, any increase in RT in an addition task will be attributed
to the repeated operation of the counting stage. In fact, Groen and
Parkman presented such a counting-based explanation of the problem size
effect-the larger the addition problem, the more increments to be added,
hence the longer the RT.
Since it was the counting stage that was of particular interest in Groen
and Parkman’s work, they proposed a reasonably exhaustive set of mod-
els which might account for the linear RT increase found among first
graders. Each model proposed a somewhat different counting algorithm
as the process occurring in the count stage.
The first model assumed that the internal counter is initially set to zero
for the problem m + n, then it is incremented by ones for the value of m,
then for the value of n. At the end of this incrementing procedure, the
value in the counter will equal the sum of m + II, and the counting stage
transfers processing to decision. (Actually, Groen and Parkman tested
their first graders in a production task, thus deleting the decision stage;
their analysis of adult performance, however, was based on true/false
verification, so the decision mechanism is included here as well.) Since it
is the sum of the numbers which equals the number of increments added,
this “count by sum” model predicts that the sum of any problem will be
the best predictor of the RT function.
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 221

The second alternative considered by Groen and Parkman can be

termed the “count by second addend” model. Assume that for all prob-
lems m + n, the counter is set to the first number m, and then is in-
cremented by n, the second number. In this model, the value of the
second addend, n, should predict RT, since the counting depends on the
second addend. The reverse of this model, set the second, then count by
the first, was also considered (“count by first addend”). As Groen and
Parkman noted, while these two models are algorithmic, in the sense that
they will generate the correct answer, they are also inefficient. For exam-
ple, the “count by second” model will require five increments to be added
in the problem 2 + 5, merely because of the position of the addends in the
original problem.
The final two models considered by Groen and Parkman were mirror
images of each other. In their “count by min” model, the internal counter
is set to the larger number in the problem, the maximum addend, and is
then incremented by ones a number of times equal to the smaller or
minimum addend. Thus, this model predicts that II increments will be
added, where II is the smaller of the two addends, thereby minimizing the
number of incrementing loops for each problem and trial. The reverse of
this model is set the counter to the minimum, then increment it by the
maximum number in the problem (the “count by maximum” model).
The results of Groen and Parkman’s experiment with first graders were
clear. Multiple regression analyses of RT (averaged across 4 days of test-
ing) compared the five structural variables of sum, first number, second
number, minimum addend, and maximum addend in terms of predictive
accuracy. The “minimum addend” variable accounted for 80% of the
variance in RT, whereas no other considered model accounted for more
than 32% of the variance. The slope of the regression line for minimum
addend was approximately 400 msec, and the intercept was approxi-
mately 2.5 sec. It would seem that first graders’ mental operations for
simple addition involve a simple counting algorithm, in which the smaller
number in the problem is “counted on” by ones to the larger number,
with this counting on process requiring about 400 msec per count.
There is one exception to this count by min RT function in children’s
addition, a nagging exception in Groen and Parkman’s work as well as
others’, which foreshadows much of the later work on this topic: Ties or
doubles (I + 1, 4 + 4, etc.) exhibit no obvious problem size effect. In
some fashion, ties are simply not subject to the normal rule of counting
that applies to other problems for these children. Groen and Parkman
(1972) presented this result, and suggested that ties are “memorized”;
they can be processed via fact retrieval rather than counting, with such
fact retrieval requiring only some constant amount of time. In terms of
their process model, this result necessitates two equations for the RT
222 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

prediction, the usual one for nontie problems, RT = k + bn, where n is the
minimum addend, and a simple RT = k equation for ties, where k now
includes both encoding and the constant retrieval time. (It was this two-
equation model which generated the slope, intercept, and R* values
above; when ties were included in the min model, R* was .57.)
A number of subsequent studies have provided support for these
counting notions in several ways. One source of support has already been
mentioned-the converging evidence from protocol studies of the fre-
quency of “counting-on” strategies (e.g., Ginsburg, 1977). A study by
Groen and Resnick (1977) confirmed the usefulness of counting ap-
proaches, and the particular efficiency of the min procedure, in an ingeni-
ous training experiment. Preschool children who knew how to count but
not add were given training in an addition algorithm corresponding to a
modified “count by sum” model; count out m blocks into one group, n
blocks into another group, then combine the groups and count by ones for
m then n. The interesting result was that after an extended practice phase,
about half of these preschool children had abandoned the trained strategy
and had spontaneously adopted the efficient min procedure. Of particular
significance was the fact that the min procedure had not been taught to the
children-indeed, there is little evidence that it is ever taught in the formal
sense. Instead, it seemed to be a spontaneous invention on their part, an
invention which corresponds with performance of first graders who are in
the process of formal training on the number facts.
Other investigators, notably Svenson and his colleagues, have extended
the min effect and the process model advanced by Groen and Parkman.
Svenson (1975) found that the min model provided the best fit to third
graders’ RT functions, both on the simple addition facts as well as on facts
with sums up to 13. Svenson and Broquist (1975) extended this result to
somewhat older children who demonstrated poor achievement in the
mathematics curriculum. They found that normal third grade data were
well fit by the min model, but that the low achievement fifth graders had
higher slope and intercept estimates. More important, these older children
had difficulties with an aspect of the task assumed to be of negligible
importance by Groen and Parkman-the determination of which of the
two addends was in fact the larger. Finally, Svenson, Hedenborg, and
Lingman (1976) suggested several additions to the simple min model,
based on their retrospective protocol task (but see Ericsson & Simon
(1980) for a discussion of the inherent difficulties of retrospective reports).
Svenson et al. suggested that there are several types of exceptions to the
min counting rule, such as near ties (5 + 4), those with zero as an addend,
and so forth. Unfortunately, Svenson et al. did not report any of their
latency data, so the predictive status of their revision is indeterminate, at
least for chronometric measures.
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 223

The appropriateness of counting-based models for children’s subtrac-

tion performance has also been investigated, with generally positive re-
sults. Woods, Resnick, and Groen (197.5) tested subjects in the second and
fourth grades on single-digit subtraction facts, and analyzed their RT data
in terms of five process models. Children from both grade levels were
found to have RT’s well fit by a hybrid model, in which “the child either
counted down from the larger number or counted up from the smaller,
depending on which procedure required the fewest steps” (p. 17). Thus,
for problems like 9 - 2, the child counted down two increments from 9;
for problems like 8 - 5, children counted from 5 up to 8, yielding three
increments. This flexible strategy had been previously identified in a
study involving open sentence problems (such as “five plus what equals
nine” Groen & Poll (1973)), and has since been replicated and extended
by Svenson and Hedenborg (1979).
The studies just reviewed provide some of the clearest examples of the
chronometric tradition in the area of children’s mental arithmetic, and
some of the most compelling evidence about the mental processes in-
volved in young children’s arithmetic performance. It appears that chil-
dren are in some sense predisposed toward counting as a general-purpose
numerical skill. Counting appears as a component of most children’s in-
formal knowledge prior to the beginning of school (Ginsburg, 1977), it is a
flexible process by which the first two arithmetic operations encountered
in school, addition and subtraction, can be accurately performed, and it is
an inventable process, even for preschoolers who have been intentionally
trained on a less efficient algorithm.

CHRONOMETRIC MODELS BEYOND THIRD GRADE

E\!idence for Fact Retrieval
Absent from the above discussion is any mention of arithmetic pro-
cesses beyond about the third-grade level. While the literature strongly
suggests a counting-based process for children’s addition and subtraction
through third grade, no information has been presented concerning older
children or adults. As it turns out, such evidence abounds and is vital in
forming an adequate model of the development of mental arithmetic.
Groen and Parkman (1972) considered the issue of adults’ processing of
simple addition facts and drew specifically on their interpretation of first
graders’ performance to tie problems in their proposal for adult perfor-
mance. Recall that they concluded that first graders had “memorized”
the answers to tie problems, yielding the flat RT function across problem
size. Having thus opened the door to the possibility of fact retrieval, they
proceeded to view it as the typical adult process for addition. They rea-
soned that since the memorized problems for first graders yielded flat RT
224 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

functions, adult performance based on memorized sums should also pro-

duce similar functions. Such a pattern would be predicted by any direct
access process in which retrieval operations take a constant amount of
time regardless of the problem. Under the assumptions of this model, the
20-msec slope of RT across minimum addend found in their adult study
was merely a misleading average, consisting of slopes of 0 msec for the
majority of trials, reflecting direct access, but a sharply increasing slope
on those few trials on which direct access had failed. Naturally, the back-
up process following retrieval failure was the min counting process iden-
tified for first graders. Quite specifically, this model predicts that overall
RT will be a combination of two distinct trial types: RT = k, where k
includes the constant time for encoding, direct access retrieval, and re-
sponse, where direct access is estimated to occur with a probability of .95;
and RT = k + bn, where k also includes any retrieval failure time, and bn
is the usual 400-msec effect across minimum addend, this equation gov-
erning RT with probability equal to .05.
It is important here to distinguish between two aspects of this argu-
ment, the general notion of fact retrieval as the typical adult process, and
the specific proposal of direct access with occasional retrieval failure.
Most investigators are in agreement on the general notion of fact
retrieval-on intuitive grounds alone it seems unlikely that adults would
continue to count on simple addition problems after years of practice. On
the other hand, there is evidence which disconfirms the specific proposal
of direct access.
In a series of four experiments, Ashcraft and Battaglia (1978) and
Ashcraft and Stazyk (1981) examined adults’ RT’s to the whole number
facts of addition. In all of these experiments, RT was found to be better
predicted by an exponentially increasing function of the sum of the prob-
lem, specifically the square of the correct sum. Of major importance here
is the incompatibility of this result with the Groen and Parkman models,
both of which predict strictly linear increases in RT. This is merely to say
that any reasonable model based on incrementing, even the direct access
model which activates the incrementing process on very few trials, pre-
dicts a linear RT effect. Further, Ashcraft and Stazyk attempted a specific
test of the direct access model, partitioning trials on the basis of a com-
puted retrieval failure rate. No evidence of flat RT functions was found,
even with an unreasonably large failure rate probability of .50.
Having suggested that fact retrieval, and not counting, is the character-
istic process used by adults, a rather obvious developmental issue arises.
If first graders count as they perform addition, and adults retrieve facts,
then when during development does the implied shift from counting to
retrieval take place? Is this shift in some way prompted by the child’s
increasing sophistication with number knowledge, such that counting it-
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 225

self now becomes the inefficient process which can be abandoned? Or is

there some developmental constraint on mental representations, such that
young children cannot be expected to form mental representations of
number?
One of these questions can be disposed of immediately, the question
concerning the young child’s ability to form mental representations of
number. Extensive research on the simple digit inequality task, deciding
which of two numbers is the smaller or larger, has demonstrated that
adults make these judgments by reference to a mental number line, a
stored memory representation of numerical magnitude. The characteristic
RT pattern for adult performance indicates that this number line is not
evenly spaced, but instead is compressed at the larger end, suggesting
proportionally smaller subjective differences between, say, the numbers 8
and 9 than between 1 and 2 (see Banks (1977) for a thorough review of the
entire area of symbolic comparisons). The corresponding evidence from
developmental studies shows that children as young as five or six seem to
possess the same sort of mental representation of number magnitudes,
and they process the inequality decisions in largely the same manner as
adults (Duncan & McFarland, 1980; Sekuler & Mierkiewicz, 1977). As a
final note here, it is precisely this operation of deciding which of two
numbers is the larger which Svenson found to be difficult for the older,
mathematically deficient children that he tested. Indeed, the simple min
counting model cannot explain why counter setting time varies as a func-
tion of number size.
Returning to the original question, there is now sufficient chronometric
evidence to indicate that the switch from procedural to declarative knowl-
edge in mental arithmetic begins at about the third-grade level. At about
the third grade, children seem to be augmenting their procedural knowl-
edge about arithmetic, their counting strategies and heuristics, with a
declarative structure, a stored body of facts from which retrieval can take
place. This inference is based on the RT patterns discovered for first
graders, RT’s predicted by the minimum addend, and for adults, RT’s
predicted by the square of the correct sum.
Ashcraft and Fierman (1982) tested children in the third, fourth, and
sixth grades in a standard true/false verification task. The children were
tested on the whole number facts of addition. Half of the problems were
presented as incorrect and were assigned answers which were wrong by 1,
5, or 7. (This split factor, the difference between the correct and incorrect
answers, is an important decision stage variable.) We analyzed RT’s with
multiple regression, seeking evidence as to which of the several possible
structural variables would provide the most adequate prediction of RT, as
well as with analysis of variance, to isolate additive and interactive fac-
tors. In a second study, subjects in grades 1 and 5 and college were tested
226 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

in a similar vein, again in order to identify the predictor variable which

accounted best for the RT effects (Fierman, 1980). As in the Groen and
Parkman studies, the intention of the analyses was to discover the nature
of the underlying stages of processing, particularly the stage responsible
for the actual addition operation.
A summary of the RT results is presented in Table 1. First notice that
beginning at the fourth grade, the best prediction equation uses correct
sum squared, the factor identified by Ashcraft and Battaglia in their initial
test of the Groen and Parkman models. Just as the nonlinear RT effects in
the digit inequality task indicate a nonproportional mental representation,
we have argued that the significance of correct sum squared indicates a
nonlinear, nonproportional mental “table” of addition facts. Under the
standard assumption (e.g., Collins & Loftus, 1975) that search time from
long-term memory is proportional to subjective distance in the mental
representation, the nonlinear RT effects starting with fourth grade suggest
the same “stretched” table of facts that we have proposed for adults.
A second important result in Table 1 is the presence of two regression
equations for the third graders. These two solutions were nearly equiva-
lent in predictive accuracy. In other words, no single variable predicted
third graders’ RT's as well as it did the older children’s. A case-by-case
examination of RT patterns revealed that 4 of the 10 third graders were
best fit by a counting variable, while only two of the fourth graders and
one of the sixth graders were best fit by counting variables.
It would be a mistake to conclude from these results that by the fourth
grade a complete set of adult-like processes is firmly entrenched. Both
third and fourth graders were enormously affected by incorrect answers in
the false problems, particularly when the answer was wrong by only 1 (6
+ 8 = IS), suggesting age differences in the operation of the decision stage

TABLE 1
SUMMARY OF REGRESSION RESULTS ON VERIFICATION OF SIMPLE ADDITION FACTS
Percentage
Grade Best equation-free entry variance

1 RT = 3204 + 516 (minimum addend) 62

3 RT = 1785 + 201 (minimum addend) 46
RT = 1707 + 6.43 (sum squared) 48
4 RT = 1298 + 4.95 (sum squared) 68
5 RT = 1167 + 4.96 (sum squared) 44
6 RT = 922 + 5.01 (sum squared) 79
College RT = 825 + 1.03 (sum squared) 47

Note. Results from grades 3,4, and 6 are from Ashcraft and Fierman (1982). Results from
grades 1, 5, and college are from Fierman (1980). The latter study used a vocal response,
the former a key-press response. This table is adapted from Fierman (1980).
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 227

as well. This, in combination with the fourth graders’ exponential RT

pattern on true problems, suggests that the transition from simple count-
ing to adult-like retrieval is in progress-the declarative structure for fact
retrieval is present, but the retrieval and decision processes which use this
structure are easily disrupted. The relationship between these procedural
and declarative processes is discussed more fully below.
Netumk Representations
In the above section, evidence for fact retrieval depended largely on the
nonlinear RT patterns observed beyond the third grade level. Note, how-
ever, that no further specification of the mental structure which uses this
fact retrieval process was offered. Any number of structural assumptions
might account for the exponential RT functions. Accordingly, we have
pursued a program of research designed to address the question of struc-
ture or organization of the stored facts in memory. Specifically, we have
tested some important predictions of the hypothesis that arithmetic facts
are represented in an interconnected network structure.
Prototypical network approaches to semantic long-term memory (Col-
lins & Loftus, 1975; Collins & Quillian, 1972) make the assumption that
facts are stored as nodes in a semantic space, with connecting pathways
or links among similar nodes. Nodes for the concepts “sparrow,”
“robin, ” “bird,” “wings,” etc., are interconnected in the structure in
such a fashion that the degree of relationship between two nodes is in-
dexed structurally by the length of the pathway. More generally, these
lengths or “semantic distances” are assumed to reflect accessibility or
retrievability of one node from another. The major retrieval process in
such models is a spreading activation process, in which some level of
activation or priming flows down the several connecting pathways in
amounts proportional to the length of the pathway.
Chronometrically, these network assumptions make several predictions
about performance in semantic memory tasks, predictions which we have
recently adapted to the topic of mental arithmetic. First, a fact, such as
“A robin has wings,” should require verification time proportional to the
distance between the concepts, this distance estimated in normative
studies (Ashcraft, 1978: Glass, Holyoak, & O’Dell, 1974). Second, this
semantic distance effect reverses for “false” comparisons; that is, “Posi-
tive judgments are facilitated if the concepts involved are closely related
semantically, while for negative judgments, relatedness acts as an inhib-
iting factor” (Kintsch, 1974, p. 199). Finally, the spread of activation
among concepts may facilitate a later response to similar material
(Ashcraft, 1976; Loftus & Loftus, 1974) or may inhibit a response if the
primed node spuriously indicates a positive relationship (“A goose can
quack,” with both nodes closely related to “duck”; see Collins & Quillian
(1972)).
228 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

Ashcraft and Battaglia (1978) considered Parkman’s (1972) proposal

that arithmetic information might be stored in a network structure. They
interpreted the problem size effect on true problems as a distance effect
analogous to that found in semantic memory research. They also
suggested that the split effect on false problems, faster RT when the
incorrect answer is wrong by a greater amount, is analogous to the dis-
tance effect on negative judgments (see also Ashcraft & Stazyk, 1981). In
these papers, it was argued that the size of the problem, indexed by the
sum or square of the sum, is to arithmetic facts what normative judgments
of distance are to semantic facts.
An explicit chronometric test of the network assumptions was provided
by Stazyk, Ashcraft, and Hamann (1982; see also Stazyk, 1980). Stazyk et
al. tested adults on a multiplication task, and found RT effects on both
true and false judgments in agreement with the semantic distance effect.
In the regression analyses, the correct answer to the problems provided a
better tit to RT than did Parkman’s (1972) sum variable. On the assump-
tion that the size of the answer was merely an index of distance in the
mental representation, a separate sample of subjects provided subjective
ratings of difficulty for the problems. Just as in semantic research, these
rated difficulty values yielded the best prediction of the RT effects. This
result was viewed as rather direct confirmation of one important network
assumption, the subjective distance to RT relationship. In our view, the
size of the problem and the rated difficulty both index accessibility within
the network, the (metaphorical) distance traversed during the search op-
eration.
In a final experiment, false problems were assigned “confusion” an-
swers, incorrect answers which were multiples of one of the problem’s
digits (for example, 7 x 4 = 21). Since multiples should be closely related
in memory, these problems were expected to reveal inhibition effects
exactly like those found in semantic memory tests-a slowing down of RT
due to the competing information which has been activated. This critical
prediction of the network approach was confirmed. In contrast to false
problems which were merely incorrect, these confusion problems yielded
much slower performance, even when the problem was presented 600
msec in advance of the incorrect answer. Our interpretation was that the
spread of activation from the problem’s multipliers primes not only the
correct answer, but it also primes related information. The more closely
related this primed information is to the target, the more likely it is that
there will be an inhibitory effect on RT.
To complete this section on network representations, we argue that it is
not just information within a single arithmetic operation which is inter-
connected, as Stazyk et al. found evidence for, but in fact that information
across operations is also interrelated in network fashion. The Stazyk et al.
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 229

confusion effect was analogous to the Winkelman and Schmidt (1974)

results on addition and multiplication. Problems like 5 + 3 = 15 were
extremely slow to verify, and extremely prone to errors, in that report.
Developmentally, we would expect such cross-operation confusion ef-
fects to emerge as the child begins to relate the facts from one operation to
those of the other. Quite recently, Hamann (1982) has found such a
cross-operation effect of confusions on RT, with a marked effect at the
10th grade, a smaller (nonsignificant) effect at 7th grade, and no confusion
effect at all at either the lst- or 4th-grade levels.
A DEVELOPMENTAL FRAMEWORK FOR MENTAL ADDITION
The framework being proposed here is a composite approach to the
evidence concerning mental arithmetic performance, and is intended in
part as a summary of the extant literature. Because of the possibility of
different routes to a correct response, the model is technically not predic-
tive in the chronometric sense until specific assumptions are added. While
the model is more complex than is necessary to explain performance at
any single developmental level, it seems appropriate to present the full
scheme, and then suggest the patterns of elaboration which seem to
characterize the developing abilities and sources of knowledge for the
child.
To begin with, the model assumes an initial stimulus encoding stage,
responsible for perception and translation of the problem into a useable
mental code. In a standard arithmetic situation, this stage would obvi-

RT- t ENCODE + t l t f t
SEARCHICOMP”TE OEClSlON RESPONSE

WHERE t s,c - f (NETWORK DISTANCE AND PROCEDURAL INVOLVEMENT)

AND t, - NEGATIVE f(SPLIT)

AND 1, t
R - K(y - INTERCEPT)
l

FIG. 3. A proposed processing model for mental arithmetic, with declarative and pro-
cedural long-term memory components. See text for a full description.
230 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

ously encode the problem in precise enough fashion to permit the highly
accurate performance that is typically observed. Since even kindergarten
children yield RT functions on the digit inequality task which resemble
adult performance (Duncan & McFarland, 1980), this stage may also be
responsible for generating relatively crude size codes (e.g., Banks et al.,
1976) for the digits in the problem, something on the order of “large +
small = large.” Such size estimates appear to play an important role in
arithmetic processing when a presented answer is wrong by a large
amount (Ashcraft & Stazyk, 1981).
Following encoding, the search/compute stage performs the actual
arithmetic component of performance. We will return to this stage
momentarily; for the present, assume that the stage has operated suc-
cessfully, and at its conclusion contains the correct answer 9 to the prob-
lem 6 + 3 = 8. The search/compute stage will now be followed by a
decision stage. Here, the computed sum of 9 is compared to the presented
8, a slow comparison which yields a mismatch and a consequent “no”
response. Notice that the decision stage in the model accesses a subjec-
tive number line for this decision, the mental representation of number
suggested by the digit inequality research. This number line has been
included here on the evidence that all subjects, first graders through
adults, yield evidence of the compressed number line in this task. While
we have found evidence of this as a component of a mental addition task
in third graders (Ashcraft & Fierman, 1982) up through adults, we have
not in fact tested the split effect at the first grade level. The operation of
this stage under a match or “true” condition is assumed to be some
constant amount of time (since split = 0), although a developmental
speeding of the stage is certainly indicated by Duncan and McFarland’s
research. For “false” stimuli, an increase in the duration of the decision
stage is found as the incorrect answer approaches the correct sum to the
problem; stated briefly, a problem which is wrong by only one or two is
much more difficult to judge incorrect than one wrong by five or six
(Ashcraft & Battaglia, 1978).
Finally, we include a response execution stage, which as in other
chronometric models is essentially uninvestigated. It is conveniently as-
sumed that the duration of the stage is a constant for any particular sub-
ject and merely becomes somewhat more rapid with increases in age.
We return now to the arithmetic stage of processing, the stage respon-
sible for the arithmetic operations considered throughout this paper. The
stage is labeled search/compute primarily by default, since a label which is
free of unintentional connotations appears to be unavailable. As it appears
in Fig. 3, the full listing of procedural and declarative information proba-
bly applies only to adults.
Consider a prototypical first grader, whether or not such a pure exam-
 MENTAL. ARITHMETIC 231

ple exists. Such a child approaches numerical problems by means of

counting strategies, especially the min counting process. With one major
exception then, the first grader’s process model for addition is essentially
that presented in Fig. 2, in which the search/compute stage is composed
entirely of a min counting strategy. The one exception, of course, is the
child’s knowledge of ties. If these problems are indeed memorized, as
seems to be the case, then children at this age will have a declarative
structure for fact retrieval, albeit a rather sparse one. Even at this age,
note, the prediction of RT depends on the subjective “distance” to be
traversed during the search. The overwhelming evidence is that ties are
uniformly easy to learn (e.g., “most students find doubles much easier to
learn than other combinations of addends” (Paige, Bazik, Budreck,
Thiessen, & Wild, 1978)). As such, it is not surprising that ties are of low
difficulty (Clapp, 1924; Wheeler, 1939), and that these uniformly low diffi-
culty ratings would predict, in normative “semantic distance” fashion,
the absence of RT effects.
Consider now the effects of continued schooling in arithmetic on the
proposed mental structures. Clearly, part of the thrust of instruction is a
mastery of the whole number facts. A great deal of time is often spent in
drilling exercises. In the current framework, this serves to “fill up” the
network structure, allowing the child to do simple fact retrieval without
resorting to slower procedures like counting. Notice that frequent ordered
drill and practice (“5 times 3 is 15, 5 times 4 is 20, 5 times 5,” etc.) may
also be responsible for some of the network connections and relatedness
effects in memory.
Equally clearly, another part of the instruction involves rather general
rules and procedures about arithmetic. For example, children must learn
how to use the whole number facts in addition for multicolumn addition
problems and how to manage such operations as carrying, borrowing in
subtraction, and so forth. This procedural information is included in the
child’s “knowledge about arithmetic” with the specific realization that
such procedures are often quite difficult for the child to master, are often
learned incorrectly and are often quite difficult for the instructor to cor-
rect. (The rich literature on such incorrect procedural knowledge, “bugs”
in problem solving/computer simulation parlance, is not described here,
since most of it does not concern chronometric aspects of performance.
See Brown & Burton (1978) and Young & O’Shea (1981) for original
reports in this domain.)
Our data indicate that the third-grade level is somewhat of a transi-
tional phase between counting and fact retrieval. The evidence suggests
that the changes in RT from the fourth-grade level on consist largely of
speeding up of the fact retrieval process, rather than changes in the pro-
cesses themselves. There have been suggestions in the literature (e.g.,
232 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

Ashcraft & Fierman, 1982; Resnick & Ford, 1981) that one of the later
elements in this speeding is an increase in the automaticity of processing
(e.g., Posner & Snyder, 1975). As yet, however, there appear to have
been no explicit attempts to test this speculation.
The later changes in procedural and declarative structures consist of
further elaboration of information, including idiosyncratic kinds of infor-
mation which individuals may invent as the need arises. By the seventh
grade, possibly, there is at least some reflection in the stored network
itself of the interconnectedness between addition and multiplication
(Hamann, 1982). For lack of evidence, it is impossible to say how exten-
sive the interconnections eventually become. Given the algorithmic
knowledge that division is an inverse operation to multiplication, for
example, it would seem entirely likely that some individuals would never
store the basic division facts in memory, or would store them in such
weak fashion that the procedural knowledge would invariably predomi-
nate. We have reasonably good evidence to support such a trade-off idea
in adults’ procedural and declarative knowledge. Stazyk et al. found very
slow and errorful performance to multiplication problems with zeroes (7
x 0 = 0). The algorithm or rule that “anything times zero equals zero”
appears to substitute for genuine network entries here and importantly
seems to generate much slower performance than that based on fact re-
trieval. On the other hand, Ashcraft and Stazyk found that adults judged
“unreasonably wrong” addition problems (7 + 9 = 3) much more rapidly
than the corresponding true problems, as if the usual retrieval process
were “short circuited” by the large mismatch in the generated size codes.
Our explanation for this, a global evaluation based on magnitude esti-
mates, is included here in the procedural component, along with a possi-
ble route directly to the response stage when the code mismatch is large
(the dotted line in Fig. 3).
How does the present framework differ from intuitive explanations of
children’s knowledge of arithmetic? The claim that development involves
an elaboration of knowledge, both declarative and procedural, is
grounded here in a chronometric approach to performance. As such, we
are not merely making the obvious statement that older children know
more about arithmetic than younger children. Instead, we claim that
knowledge of arithmetic involves two major components, each with its
own chronometric characteristics: knowledge of arithmetic in a network
of stored facts and a body of procedural knowledge about arithmetic. The
latter serves two functions: it guides fact retrieval, especially in situations
(43 + 59 = ?) where fact retrieval is augmented by operations like carrying
(see Experiment 2, Ashcraft & Stazyk (1981) for the emergence of the
carry operation in RT measures); and it may substitute for declarative
 MENTAL ARITHMETIC 233

knowledge of basic number facts. In certain circumstances, one of these

two major components can be isolated as the source of performance. For
adults doing simple addition or multiplication, the network structure de-
termines the duration of the search/compute stage; for first graders, pro-
cedural knowledge of counting determines RT. At intermediate age levels,
performance will undoubtedly consist of different contributions from both
components. Such an indeterminate basis for prediction should be viewed
as a challenge, we believe. For example, Ashcraft and Fierman’s third
graders, easily disrupted by an incorrect answer to simple addition prob-
lems, may under pressure of accuracy demands rely more heavily on
“safe” procedures like counting; under instructions which emphasize
speed, however, they may exhibit RT functions more typical of fact re-
trieval. Adults, for that matter, may be induced to fall back on procedural
knowledge, or may be tested in situations where we are confident that no
declarative knowledge is available (such as the “75 minus x” subtraction
facts).
The general chronometric relationship proposed here is that solution
speed, the duration of the search/compute stage, will increase as the
involvement of procedural knowledge increases. If a subject, at what-
ever developmental level, has both a declarative and procedural source
for the needed information (6 x 2 = ?), then the procedural solution, such
as counting by two’s, will be the slower of the two. For such situations,
the duration of the search/compute stage will depend on the race between
procedural and declarative knowledge, and the relative accessibility of
each source. Training studies, studies involving heavy doses of practice,
or studies on alternate tasks (such as base 8 addition, for example) may be
useful to support this claim.
Having argued almost exclusively about chronometric methods and
evidence, we conclude the paper on three brief cautionary notes. First,
we have taken an intentionally nomothetic approach, as if children within
a certain grade level are homogenous with respect to arithmetic knowl-
edge and performance. While this is surely inaccurate in the specific
sense, the criticism is at least partially balanced by the realization that
idiosyncratic characteristics, if they are identifiable through other means,
can in fact be translated into chronometric predictions (or vice versa).
Second, the reductionistic approach may be misleading in some cir-
cumstances; for example, Capon and Kuhn’s shoppers might perform
adequately on the components of proportional reasoning, as studied in the
laboratory, but still fail to apply them accurately in naturalistic settings.
Finally, as important as chronometric evidence is, our conclusions re-
quire support and validation from converging operations, like that the
Groen and Parkman min model enjoys from the interview studies. Such
 234 MARK H. ASHCRAFT

mutual validation across substantially different paradigms strengthens

both research traditions, and will be necessary for an adequate psychol-
ogy of mathematical cognition.

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RECEIVED: March 25, 1982