So numerous and rather confusing … integrating insights on the grounded, embodied, and situated nature of spatial-numerical association.

Abstract

Spatial-numerical associations have been widely studied in the last 2 decades and have brought important advancements for embodied cognition theories on knowledge representation. Over the years, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance has contributed to disseminate seminal studies highlighting the role of grounded invariants (e.g., vertical spatial-numerical association of response codes, Hartmann et al., 2014), cultural habits (e.g., reading/writing direction, Shaki & Fischer, 2012; Shaki et al., 2012; Zohar-Shai et al., 2017), and situated constraints (e.g., mirror numbers, Marzola & Cohen, 2023; alternative number arrangements, Mingolo et al., 2021) on numerical representation. In this perspective article, we briefly review the contribution of these articles in the field, and we propose a broad overview of how these findings fit into grounded, embodied, and situated perspectives on numerical cognition. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).