News Psychology

Geometric minds skip school

Amazonian villagers grasp abstract spatial concepts

By Bruce Bower

- More than 2 years ago

In a South American jungle, far from traffic circles, city squares and the Pentagon, beats the heart of geometry.

ANGLE MAN Taking part in a study that looked at intuitive understanding of geometric principles, a Mundurucú villager in Brazil’s Amazon basin uses a device provided by experimenters to estimate the size of a missing third angle from a partial triangle shown on a computer screen.