Although many school-going youth might disagree, a new study finds that geometry is an intuitive subject that is easy to grasp even in the absence of formal training.

Researchers posed questions in Euclidean planar geometry to adults and children from the Mundurucú community, an isolated indigenous group in the Amazon. Despite having no formal education, the Mundurucú were able to quickly grasp concepts in planar geometry relating to points, lines and triangles.

The study appears in the current issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The Mundurucú were able to correctly answer questions like, “Can a line be made to cross two other parallel-looking lines?” and “Can a line cross one of two parallel-looking lines but not the other?”