ArticleNeuroImage2018
A preference for mathematical processing outweighs the selectivity for Arabic numbers in the inferior temporal gyrus.
Article in NeuroImage, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 34 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
34 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 58 citations in OpenAlex.
- Brain-wide decoding of numbers and letters: Converging evidence from multivariate fMRI analysis and probabilistic meta-analysis.Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior · 2025Pooled it
- Dysfunctions associated with the intraparietal sulcus and a distributed network in individuals with math learning difficulties: An ALE meta-analysis.Human brain mapping · 2023Pooled it
- Regions in the human inferior temporal gyrus are engaged in numerosity processing across visual stimulus categories.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2026Article
- Visual Word Form Area demonstrates individual and task-agnostic consistency but inter-individual variability.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2026Article
- Temporal order of activations and interactions during arithmetic calculations measured by intracranial electrophysiological recordings in the human brain.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Crossroads in the Learning Brain: The Neural Overlap Between Arithmetic and Phonological Processing.Human brain mapping · 2026Article
- Distinct neural representational geometries of numerosity in early visual and association regions across visual streams.Communications biology · 2025Article
- Personalized deep neural networks reveal mechanisms of math learning disabilities in children.Science advances · 2025Article
- Functional connectivity across multi-frequency bands in patients with tension-type headache: a resting-state fMRI retrospective study.BMC medical imaging · 2025Article
- Attenuated processing of task-irrelevant speech and other auditory stimuli: fMRI evidence from arithmetic tasks.The European journal of neuroscience · 2024Article
- Both mOTS-words and pOTS-words prefer emoji stimuli over text stimuli during a lexical judgment task.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2024Article
- Long-term abacus training gains in children are predicted by medial temporal lobe anatomy and circuitry.Developmental science · 2024Article
- Spatiotemporal Dynamics of Successive Activations across the Human Brain during Simple Arithmetic Processing.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2024Article
- Both mOTS-words and pOTS-words prefer emoji stimuli over text stimuli during a reading task.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- Distinct Contributions of the Cerebellum and Basal Ganglia to Arithmetic Procedures.The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2024Article
- Structural and functional connectivity of the inferior temporal numeral area.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2023Article
- Neural representations of the perception of handwritten digits and visual objects from a convolutional neural network compared to humans.Human brain mapping · 2023Article
- The two-network framework of number processing: a step towards a better understanding of the neural origins of developmental dyscalculia.Journal of neural transmission (Vienna, Austria : 1996) · 2023Article
- Representations within the Intraparietal Sulcus Distinguish Numerical Tasks and Formats.Journal of cognitive neuroscience · 2023Article
- Impaired Arithmetic Fact Retrieval in an Adult with Developmental Dyscalculia: Evidence from Behavioral and Functional Brain Imaging Data.Brain sciences · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
A region in the posterior inferior temporal gyrus (ITG), referred to as the number form area (NFA, here ITG-numbers) has been implicated in the visual processing of Arabic numbers. However, it is unknown if this region is specifically involved in the visual encoding of Arabic numbers per se or in mathematical processing more broadly. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during experiments that systematically vary tasks and stimuli, we find that mathematical processing, not preference to Arabic numbers, consistently drives both mean and distributed responses in the posterior ITG. While we replicated findings of higher responses in ITG-numbers to numbers than other visual stimuli during a 1-back task, this preference to numbers was abolished when participants engaged in mathematical processing. In contrast, an ITG region (ITG-math) that showed higher responses during an adding task vs. other tasks maintained this preference for mathematical processing across a wide range of stimuli including numbers, number/letter morphs, hands, and dice. Analysis of distributed responses across an anatomically-defined posterior ITG expanse further revealed that mathematical task but not Arabic number form can be successfully and consistently decoded from these distributed responses. Together, our findings suggest that the function of neuronal regions in the posterior ITG goes beyond the specific visual processing of Arabic numbers. We hypothesize that they ascribe numerical content to the visual input, irrespective of the format of the stimulus.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.