Research News Last updated 22 May
Birmingham City University (BCU) researchers are calling for parents and young people to take part in a neurodevelopment project.
The project, from the EEG and Development Research Group, is hoping to improve on current EEG research and provide a clearer understanding of how children’s brains process numerical information, and why some children find maths more difficult than others.
“This research will help us understand how the brain develops the ability to work with numbers, and as a result why some children struggle with maths,” said Principal Investigator Dr Jessica Ann Diaz, Lecturer in Psychology at BCU.
“By uncovering how the brain handles and processes numbers in its early development, we want to pave the way for earlier diagnosis and better support for children with learning difficulties such as dyscalculia.”
After a second grant of £1,500 from the Start-Up Grant, the findings will allow healthcare professionals to identify children at risk of mathematical learning difficulties at an earlier age and with more accuracy too.
In the long term, the research could also be used to help design targeted educational interventions, improve learning outcomes and reduce long-term academic and social disadvantages with earlier diagnosis and better knowledge.
Researchers need children aged between four and 12 to take part in an hour-long study while wearing an EEG cap.
They’ll spend up to 15 minutes viewing dots on a screen, then decide which side has more dots.
Sessions are available on weekdays after 4pm and on weekends until 31 July 2025.
Find out more about the Cognition, Disorders and Computation Lab here.