| Brian Butterworth | |
|---|---|
| Born | Brian Butterworth |
| Nationality | British |
| Fields | Mathematical psychology, Dyslexia and Speech science |
| Institutions | Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London |
| Alma mater | Merton College, Oxford |
|
Notes
Fellow of the British Academy |
|
Brian Butterworth is a professor of cognitive neuropsychology in the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London. His research has ranged from speech errors and pauses, short-term memory deficits, dyslexia, reading both in alphabetic scripts and Chinese, and mathematics and dyscalculia. His book The Mathematical Brain[1] has been translated into four languages. He was Editor-in-Chief of Linguistics (1978–1983) and a founding editor of the journals, "Language and Cognitive Processes" and "Mathematical Cognition". He is a Fellow of the British Academy.
In 1984 he diagnosed President Ronald Reagan on the basis of speech errors in his presidential re-election speeches in an article in the Sunday Times as having Alzheimer’s disease ten years before this was formally identified.[2][3][4] He was a coauthor in 1971 of a pamphet, Marked for life, critical of university examinations.[5]
He designed the world’s largest mathematical experiment involving over 18,000 people at Explore-At-Bristol.[6] The results were announced in Sept 2003 and found that women were faster at subitizing.[7] With Storm Thorgerson, Butterworth created the “From Babble to Babel” 2000 exhibit at the Mind Zone in the Millennium Dome.
Subitizing concerns the ability to instantly identify the number of items without counting. Collections of four or below are usually subitized with collections of larger numbers being counted. Brian Butterworth designed an experiment that ran as an interactive exhibit at the Explore-At-Bristol science museum to find whether subitizing differed between women and men. Participants were asked to estimate as fast as they could between one and 10 dots and press the answer on a touch screen. How long they took—their reaction time--was measured. Over 18,000 people took part—the largest number ever to take part in a mathematical cognition experiment.[7] He announced his finding that women were better than men at subitizing at the British Association for the Advancement of Science's 2003 annual science festival.[7] He also found that people were six per cent faster on calculating the number of dots if they were presented on the left side of the screen (and so right sided lateralized in the brain) but only if there were five or more and so counted.[7][8]
(1999). London: Macmillan. ISBN 978-0333766101
Published in the same year in the US as What Counts New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-0684854175
Powell A. Butterworth B. (1971). Marked for life: a criticism of assessment at universities. London, Anarchist Group ISBN 9780901807014
Butterworth B. (1980). Language Production Volume 1: Speech and talk Academic Pr ISBN 978-0121475017
Butterworth B. (1983). Language Production Volume 2: Development, Writing and Other Language Processes Academic Pr ISBN 978-0121475024
Butterworth B. Comrie B. Dahl O. (1984). Explanations for Language Universals Mouton De Gruyter ISBN 978-3110097979
Butterworth, B. (2004). Dyscalculia Guidance Helping Pupils with Specific Learning Difficulties in Maths. David Fulton ISBN 978-0708711521