Elementary school students who learn to calculate using a mental abacus tend to perform better on math tests than their peers. A recent study published in Learning and Individual Differences suggests that this educational technique is associated with stronger arithmetic performance. The research indicates that this math advantage is partly explained by enhanced numerical processing skills alongside improved attention and memory.
Abacus-based mental calculation is a distinct educational strategy popular in many East Asian classrooms. Students first learn to solve arithmetic problems by manipulating the beads of a physical abacus. An upper bead represents the number five, while lower beads represent the number one. Moving beads toward a central beam indicates addition, while moving them away indicates subtraction.
As students gain proficiency with the physical tool, they are taught to visualize the abacus in their minds. They begin to perform mental calculations by moving their fingers in the air, mimicking the physical manipulation of the beads. Eventually, the students rely entirely on this internal visual representation to solve complex math problems without any physical aids.
Educational psychologists generally divide the cognitive foundations of math into two categories. Domain-specific skills involve direct numerical processing, such as recognizing magnitudes and sequencing numbers. Domain-general skills encompass broader mental abilities, such as short-term memory, attention control, and spatial reasoning, which help a person maintain focus and juggle information during calculations.
Prior research has shown that abacus instruction is linked to better math scores, but the underlying cognitive pathways have remained somewhat ambiguous. To investigate how these specific and general mental skills contribute to the abacus advantage, an investigative team designed a new evaluation. The research was led by Fan Liu and Xuelian Ge of Zhejiang University, alongside colleagues from the University of Texas at Austin.
The researchers evaluated 441 elementary school children across grades one through five at three different schools in Qiqihar, China. Within each grade level, the researchers randomly selected intact classrooms to compare. Half of the participants were in classes that received two hours of abacus instruction each week, while the control group received standard math and reading exercises.
The evaluation process began with a series of arithmetic and numerical processing assessments. The students completed timed paper-and-pencil tests involving addition, subtraction, and finding missing terms in an equation. Students in the third grade and above also completed multiplication and division problems. The numerical processing portion asked children to count figures within a time limit, connect randomly distributed numbers in ascending order, and compare numerical values.
The results showed that students in the abacus group outperformed the control group in overall arithmetic skills. This advantage was observable across all five grade levels. Even first-grade students, who had only received three months of abacus instruction at the time of testing, displayed a measurable advantage in math scores over their peers. The abacus students also performed better on the numerical processing tasks, demonstrating a heightened ability to connect and compare numbers.
The researchers also looked at the students’ end-of-semester mathematics exam scores. These school-administered exams covered broader math applications, basic geometry, and complex problem-solving. The abacus group outperformed the control group on these real-world exams in grades two through five, mirroring the experimental test results and providing additional context for their academic achievement.
Next, the researchers administered a battery of nine online tests to measure domain-general cognitive abilities. These interactive tasks evaluated a wide range of mental functions. For example, spatial ability was measured by asking children to mentally rotate three-dimensional objects on a screen to find a matching shape. Cognitive flexibility was tested using a card-sorting game where students had to adapt to changing categorization rules based on color, shape, or number.
The online battery also heavily tested memory and attention. Short-term memory was evaluated by having students memorize picture pairs or repeat a sequence of flashing squares on a grid. To assess attention, students completed cancellation tasks where they had to quickly scan hundreds of numbers and cross out specific target digits within a tight time limit.
The abacus students exhibited distinct advantages in short-term memory and attention compared to the control group. However, these specific cognitive benefits did not appear uniformly across all ages. The advantages in sustained attention and memory were most pronounced in the fourth and fifth graders. This suggests that domain-general cognitive benefits might require several years of sustained abacus practice to fully emerge as an observable trait.
To understand how these different skill sets interacted, the researchers conducted statistical mediation analyses. This mathematical modeling technique helps determine whether an observed effect, like better math scores, is explained by intermediate variables, such as memory or number sense. The researchers wanted to see if the enhanced cognitive and numerical skills directly accounted for the arithmetic advantage seen in the abacus group.
The models revealed that numerical processing skills partially explained the math advantage for abacus students in grades two through five. This means the abacus training likely boosted their foundational number sense, which in turn improved their math test scores. In contrast, general cognitive skills like attention and short-term memory only acted as explanatory bridges for students in the fourth and fifth grades.
These patterns suggest a shifting developmental pathway for students learning mental abacus calculation. In the early years of elementary school, the math benefits appear strictly tied to an improved understanding of numbers and magnitudes. For first-grade students, the math advantage was not explained by these intermediate variables, suggesting that their early benefits might stem from basic physical familiarity with numbers rather than internalized cognitive changes.
As students accumulate more years of practice, the continuous mental visualization required by the abacus begins to heavily engage broader cognitive functions. Holding a mental image of shifting beads in the mind’s eye requires a robust working memory and sustained attention. Those enhanced general mental capacities then provide an additional boost to their arithmetic performance.
There are a few caveats to consider when interpreting these results. The study relied on a cross-sectional design, meaning it compared different cohorts of students at a single point in time rather than tracking the same individuals over several years. Because of this design, the researchers cannot definitively prove a causal sequence where prolonged training directly alters cognitive development over time. A longitudinal study tracking the same children from kindergarten through fifth grade would provide firmer evidence.
Additionally, the researchers compared intact classrooms rather than randomly assigning individual students to different training groups. The researchers noted that baseline testing was not conducted prior to the start of the first grade. While the first-grade control and abacus groups were comparable on most initial measures, the lack of baseline data means pre-existing differences or teacher-specific variables cannot be entirely ruled out as contributing factors to the observed outcomes.
The study, “Enhancing children’s arithmetic skills through abacus learning: contributions of numerical processing skills and domain-general cognitive abilities,” was authored by Fan Liu, Xuelian Ge, Peng Peng, Tianyong Xu, Tengfei Wang, and Feiyan Chen.