Overview of studies made in the digital brain
Two studies of the January 18, 2007, issue of the journal Neuron, published by Cell Press, an important light on how the brain processes numerical information - both abstract quantities and their concrete representations as symbols. Research has shown that the results will help to understand how the brain processes information and result in quantitative studies of how numerical representation in the brain develops in children. These studies could help to rehabilitate those who suffer from dyscalculia - an inability to understand, store and manipulate numbers.The researchers also said their findings provide insight into the mystery of how the brain learns to associate abstract symbols precisely with quantities.Both studies show in unprecedented detail how structures in the
parietal cortex - the region of higher cognitive processing just above the forehead - activates during perception of abstract quantities and numerical symbols. In an article, Manuela Piazza and colleagues showed that regions of the parietal lobe are activated in response to the numbers, either when presented as models of dots or Arabic numerals. In their experiments, the researchers asked human volunteers to pay attention to the quantities conveyed by groups of dots or numeric digits presented to them.During the process, the brains of the subjects scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), in which harmless magnetic fields and radio waves are used to measure the blood flow in brain regions, reflecting the activity.The researchers found that the initial
presentation of numeric stimuli activated the parietal region of the brain in people who fell while they adapted to the stimuli. However, the activation is recovered when subjects were presented with a sudden change in the amount, was already represented in the same (points than points) or different (points versus Arabic numerals) notation as the original. This rebound indicated that the region was processing numerical information. Pages: [1] 2 3 4 5