The semantic control network mediates the relationship between symbolic numerical order processing and arithmetic performance in children

Abstract

Behavioural and neuroimaging studies have recently demonstrated that symbolic numerical order processing (i.e., deciding whether numbers are in an increasing/decreasing sequence or not) and symbolic numerical magnitude processing (e.g., deciding which of two numerals is larger) engage different cognitive mechanisms and brain regions. Because of this dissociation, growing interest has emerged to better understand the neurocognitive mechanisms of symbolic numerical order processing and their relationship to individual differences in arithmetic performance. In the present functional imaging work, we further investigated this link in a group of thirty children (7.2–10.25 years) from elementary school, who completed a symbolic numerical order verification (are the numbers going up? e.g., 1-2-3) and a symbolic numerical magnitude comparison task (which is the larger number? e.g., 5–7) inside the scanner, as well as an arithmetic fluency test outside the scanner. Behavioural results demonstrated the unique role of numerical order to predict children's arithmetic skills and confirmed its mediating power to explain the association between numerical magnitude and arithmetic performance. Imaging results showed a significant association between numerical order and arithmetic in the intersection of the right inferior frontal gyrus and insula, as well as the posterior middle temporal gyrus. An age-dependent change in brain activity was found in the left intraparietal sulcus. These findings solidify the developmental importance of symbolic numerical order processing in children and provide new evidence that the semantic control network mediates the relationship with arithmetic performance.