Distinct representations of subtraction and multiplication in the neural systems for numerosity and language.

ABSTRACT: It has been proposed that recent cultural inventions such as symbolic arithmetic recycle evolutionary older neural mechanisms. A central assumption of this hypothesis is that the degree to which a preexisting mechanism is recycled depends on the degree of similarity between its initial function and the novel task. To test this assumption, we investigated whether the brain region involved in magnitude comparison in the intraparietal sulcus (IPS), localized by a numerosity comparison task, is recruited to a greater degree by arithmetic problems that involve number comparison (single-digit subtractions) than by problems that involve retrieving number facts from memory (single-digit multiplications). Our results confirmed that subtractions are associated with greater activity in the IPS than m

SUBMITTER: Prado J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3117906 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature