Sources of Mathematical Thinking: Behavioral and Brain-Imaging Evidence

• Published in: Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Vol. 284; no. 5416; pp. 970 - 974
• Main Authors: Dehaene, S., Spelke, E., Pinel, P., Stanescu, R., Tsivkin, S.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Society for the Advancement of Science 07-05-1999; American Association for the Advancement of Science; The American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Subjects: Addition; Adult; Anatomical correlates of behavior; Approximation; Arithmetic; Behavior; Behavioral neuroscience; Behavioral psychophysiology; Biological and medical sciences; Brain; Brain Mapping; Cognition; Cognition & reasoning; Cognitive Processes; Computation; Cubes; Evidence; Evoked Potentials; Eye Movements; Female; Frontal Lobe - physiology; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Generalization; Humans; Intuition; Language; Language of Instruction; Language Role; Lesions; Linguistic Competence; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Male; Mathematical ability; Mathematics; Motor Reactions; Neural conduction; Parietal Lobe - physiology; Physiological aspects; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Thinking; Human; Language; Mental representation; Central nervous system; Information processing; Mathematics; Arithmetic operation; Brain (vertebrata); Emission tomography
• ISSN: 0036-8075; 1095-9203
• DOI: 10.1126/science.284.5416.970

Does the human capacity for mathematical intuition depend on linguistic competence or on visuo-spatial representations? A series of behavioral and brain-imaging experiments provides evidence for both sources. Exact arithmetic is acquired in a language-specific format, transfers poorly to a different language or to novel facts, and recruits networks involved in word-association processes. In contrast, approximate arithmetic shows language independence, relies on a sense of numerical magnitudes, and recruits bilateral areas of the parietal lobes involved in visuo-spatial processing. Mathematical intuition may emerge from the interplay of these brain systems.