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Saccone EJ, Tian M, Bedny M. Developing cortex is functionally pluripotent: Evidence from blindness. Dev Cogn Neurosci 2024; 66:101360. [PMID: 38394708 PMCID: PMC10899073 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2024.101360] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/25/2023] [Revised: 01/25/2024] [Accepted: 02/19/2024] [Indexed: 02/25/2024] Open
Abstract
How rigidly does innate architecture constrain function of developing cortex? What is the contribution of early experience? We review insights into these questions from visual cortex function in people born blind. In blindness, occipital cortices are active during auditory and tactile tasks. What 'cross-modal' plasticity tells us about cortical flexibility is debated. On the one hand, visual networks of blind people respond to higher cognitive information, such as sentence grammar, suggesting drastic repurposing. On the other, in line with 'metamodal' accounts, sighted and blind populations show shared domain preferences in ventral occipito-temporal cortex (vOTC), suggesting visual areas switch input modality but perform the same or similar perceptual functions (e.g., face recognition) in blindness. Here we bring these disparate literatures together, reviewing and synthesizing evidence that speaks to whether visual cortices have similar or different functions in blind and sighted people. Together, the evidence suggests that in blindness, visual cortices are incorporated into higher-cognitive (e.g., fronto-parietal) networks, which are a major source long-range input to the visual system. We propose the connectivity-constrained experience-dependent account. Functional development is constrained by innate anatomical connectivity, experience and behavioral needs. Infant cortex is pluripotent, the same anatomical constraints develop into different functional outcomes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Elizabeth J Saccone
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA.
| | - Mengyu Tian
- Center for Educational Science and Technology, Beijing Normal University at Zhuhai, China
| | - Marina Bedny
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA
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2
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Yeo DJ, Pollack C, Conrad BN, Price GR. Functional and representational differences between bilateral inferior temporal numeral areas. Cortex 2024; 171:113-135. [PMID: 37992508 DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2023.08.018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/27/2022] [Revised: 12/15/2022] [Accepted: 08/09/2023] [Indexed: 11/24/2023]
Abstract
The processing of numerals as visual objects is supported by an "Inferior Temporal Numeral Area" (ITNA) in the bilateral inferior temporal gyri (ITG). Extant findings suggest some degree of hemispheric asymmetry in how the bilateral ITNAs process numerals. Pollack and Price (2019) reported such a hemispheric asymmetry by which a region in the left ITG was sensitive to digits during a visual search for a digit among letters, and a homologous region in the right ITG that showed greater digit sensitivity in individuals with higher calculation skills. However, the ITG regions were localized with separate analyses without directly contrasting their digit sensitivities and relation to calculation skills. So, the extent of and reasons for these functional asymmetries remain unclear. Here we probe whether the functional and representational properties of the ITNAs are asymmetric by applying both univariate and multivariate region-of-interest analyses to Pollack and Price's (2019) data. Contrary to the implications of the original findings, digit sensitivity did not differ between ITNAs, and digit sensitivity in both left and right ITNAs was associated with calculation skills. Representational similarity analyses revealed that the overall representational geometries of digits in the ITNAs were also correlated, albeit weakly, but the representational contents of the ITNAs were largely inconclusive. Nonetheless, we found a right lateralization in engagement in alphanumeric categorization, and that the right ITNA showed greater discriminability between digits and letters. Greater right lateralization of digit sensitivity and digit discriminability in the left ITNA were also related to higher calculation skills. Our findings thus suggest that the ITNAs may not be functionally identical and should be directly contrasted in future work. Our study also highlights the importance of within-individual comparisons for understanding hemispheric asymmetries, and analyses of individual differences and multivariate features to uncover effects that would otherwise be obscured by averages.
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Affiliation(s)
- Darren J Yeo
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA; Division of Psychology, School of Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
| | - Courtney Pollack
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
| | - Benjamin N Conrad
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
| | - Gavin R Price
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA; Department of Psychology, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.
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3
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Arbel R, Heimler B, Amedi A. Rapid plasticity in the ventral visual stream elicited by a newly learnt auditory script in congenitally blind adults. Neuropsychologia 2023; 190:108685. [PMID: 37741551 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2023.108685] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/15/2022] [Revised: 08/07/2023] [Accepted: 09/20/2023] [Indexed: 09/25/2023]
Abstract
Accumulating evidence in the last decades has given rise to a new theory of brain organization, positing that cortical regions are recruited for specific tasks irrespective of the sensory modality via which information is channeled. For instance, the visual reading network has been shown to be recruited for reading via the tactile Braille code in congenitally blind adults. Yet, how rapidly non-typical sensory input modulates activity in typically visual regions is yet to be explored. To this aim, we developed a novel reading orthography, termed OVAL, enabling congenitally blind adults to quickly acquire reading via the auditory modality. OVAL uses the EyeMusic, a visual-to-auditory sensory-substitution-device (SSD) to transform visually presented letters optimized for auditory transformation into sound. Using fMRI, we show modulation in the right ventral visual stream following 2-h of same-day training. Crucially, following more extensive training (i.e., ∼12 h) we show that OVAL reading recruits the left ventral visual stream including the location of the Visual Word Form Area, a key graphene-responsive region within the visual reading network. Our results show that while after 2 h of SSD training we can already observe the recruitment of the deprived ventral visual stream by auditory stimuli, computation-selective cross-modal recruitment requires longer training to establish.
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Affiliation(s)
- Roni Arbel
- Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Jerusalem, Israel; Department of Pediatrics, Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital, Jerusalem, Israel.
| | - Benedetta Heimler
- Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Jerusalem, Israel; The Institute for Brain, Mind and Technology, Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzeliya, Israel; Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation (CATR), The Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel Hashomer, Israel
| | - Amir Amedi
- Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Jerusalem, Israel; The Institute for Brain, Mind and Technology, Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzeliya, Israel
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4
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Dȩbska A, Wójcik M, Chyl K, Dziȩgiel-Fivet G, Jednoróg K. Beyond the Visual Word Form Area - a cognitive characterization of the left ventral occipitotemporal cortex. Front Hum Neurosci 2023; 17:1199366. [PMID: 37576470 PMCID: PMC10416454 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2023.1199366] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/03/2023] [Accepted: 07/10/2023] [Indexed: 08/15/2023] Open
Abstract
The left ventral occipitotemporal cortex has been traditionally viewed as a pathway for visual object recognition including written letters and words. Its crucial role in reading was strengthened by the studies on the functionally localized "Visual Word Form Area" responsible for processing word-like information. However, in the past 20 years, empirical studies have challenged the assumptions of this brain region as processing exclusively visual or even orthographic stimuli. In this review, we aimed to present the development of understanding of the left ventral occipitotemporal cortex from the visually based letter area to the modality-independent symbolic language related region. We discuss theoretical and empirical research that includes orthographic, phonological, and semantic properties of language. Existing results showed that involvement of the left ventral occipitotemporal cortex is not limited to unimodal activity but also includes multimodal processes. The idea of the integrative nature of this region is supported by the broad functional and structural connectivity with language-related and attentional brain networks. We conclude that although the function of the area is not yet fully understood in human cognition, its role goes beyond visual word form processing. The left ventral occipitotemporal cortex seems to be crucial for combining higher-level language information with abstract forms that convey meaning independently of modality.
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Affiliation(s)
- Agnieszka Dȩbska
- Laboratory of Language Neurobiology, Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Marta Wójcik
- Laboratory of Language Neurobiology, Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Katarzyna Chyl
- Laboratory of Language Neurobiology, Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
- The Educational Research Institute, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Gabriela Dziȩgiel-Fivet
- Laboratory of Language Neurobiology, Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Katarzyna Jednoróg
- Laboratory of Language Neurobiology, Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
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5
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Harduf A, Shaked A, Yaniv AU, Salomon R. Disentangling the Neural Correlates of Agency, Ownership and Multisensory Processing. Neuroimage 2023:120255. [PMID: 37414232 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2023.120255] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/23/2022] [Revised: 06/25/2023] [Accepted: 06/27/2023] [Indexed: 07/08/2023] Open
Abstract
The experience of the self as an embodied agent in the world is an essential aspect of human consciousness. This experience arises from the feeling of control over one's bodily actions, termed the Sense of Agency, and the feeling that the body belongs to the self, Body Ownership. Despite long-standing philosophical and scientific interest in the relationship between the body and brain, the neural systems involved in Body Ownership and Sense of Agency, and especially their interactions, are not yet understood. In this preregistered study using the Moving Rubber Hand Illusion inside an MR-scanner, we aimed to uncover the relationship between Body Ownership and Sense of Agency in the human brain. Importantly, by using both visuomotor and visuotactile stimulations and measuring online trial-by-trial fluctuations in the illusion magnitude, we were able to disentangle brain systems related to objective sensory stimulation and subjective judgments of the bodily-self. Our results indicate that at both the behavioral and neural levels, Body Ownership and Sense of Agency are strongly interrelated. Multisensory regions in the occipital and fronto-parietal regions encoded convergence of sensory stimulation conditions. The subjective judgments of the bodily-self were related to BOLD fluctuations in the Somatosensory cortex and in regions not activated by the sensory conditions, such as the insular cortex and precuneus. Our results highlight the convergence of multisensory processing in specific neural systems for both Body Ownership and Sense of Agency with partially dissociable regions for subjective judgments in regions of the Default Mode Network.
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Affiliation(s)
- Amir Harduf
- The Multidisciplinary Brain Research Center, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 5290002, Israel; The Faculty of Life Sciences, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 5290002, Israel
| | - Ariel Shaked
- The Multidisciplinary Brain Research Center, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 5290002, Israel
| | - Adi Ulmer Yaniv
- The Multidisciplinary Brain Research Center, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 5290002, Israel; Center for Developmental Social Neuroscience, Reichman University, Herzliya 4610101, Israel
| | - Roy Salomon
- Department of Cognitive Sciences, Haifa University, Haifa 31905, Israel; The Multidisciplinary Brain Research Center, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 5290002, Israel
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6
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Yizhar O, Tal Z, Amedi A. Loss of action-related function and connectivity in the blind extrastriate body area. Front Neurosci 2023; 17:973525. [PMID: 36968509 PMCID: PMC10035577 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2023.973525] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/20/2022] [Accepted: 02/23/2023] [Indexed: 03/11/2023] Open
Abstract
The Extrastriate Body Area (EBA) participates in the visual perception and motor actions of body parts. We recently showed that EBA’s perceptual function develops independently of visual experience, responding to stimuli with body-part information in a supramodal fashion. However, it is still unclear if the EBA similarly maintains its action-related function. Here, we used fMRI to study motor-evoked responses and connectivity patterns in the congenitally blind brain. We found that, unlike the case of perception, EBA does not develop an action-related response without visual experience. In addition, we show that congenital blindness alters EBA’s connectivity profile in a counterintuitive way—functional connectivity with sensorimotor cortices dramatically decreases, whereas connectivity with perception-related visual occipital cortices remains high. To the best of our knowledge, we show for the first time that action-related functions and connectivity in the visual cortex could be contingent on visuomotor experience. We further discuss the role of the EBA within the context of visuomotor control and predictive coding theory.
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Affiliation(s)
- Or Yizhar
- Department of Cognitive and Brain Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
- Ivcher School of Psychology, The Institute for Brain, Mind and Technology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
- Research Group Adaptive Memory and Decision Making, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany
- *Correspondence: Or Yizhar,
| | - Zohar Tal
- Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal
| | - Amir Amedi
- Ivcher School of Psychology, The Institute for Brain, Mind and Technology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
- The Ruth & Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
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7
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Wilkey ED, Gupta I, Peiris A, Ansari D. The mathematical brain at rest. Curr Opin Behav Sci 2023. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cobeha.2022.101246] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/20/2023]
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8
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Koch GE, Libertus ME, Fiez JA, Coutanche MN. Representations within the Intraparietal Sulcus Distinguish Numerical Tasks and Formats. J Cogn Neurosci 2023; 35:226-240. [PMID: 36306247 PMCID: PMC9832368 DOI: 10.1162/jocn_a_01933] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/02/2023]
Abstract
How does our brain understand the number five when it is written as an Arabic numeral, and when presented as five fingers held up? Four facets have been implicated in adult numerical processing: semantic, visual, manual, and phonological/verbal. Here, we ask how the brain represents each, using a combination of tasks and stimuli. We collected fMRI data from adult participants while they completed our novel "four number code" paradigm. In this paradigm, participants viewed one of two stimulus types to tap into the visual and manual number codes, respectively. Concurrently, they completed one of two tasks to tap into the semantic and phonological/verbal number codes, respectively. Classification analyses revealed that neural codes representing distinctions between the number comparison and phonological tasks were generalizable across format (e.g., Arabic numerals to hands) within intraparietal sulcus (IPS), angular gyrus, and precentral gyrus. Neural codes representing distinctions between formats were generalizable across tasks within visual areas such as fusiform gyrus and calcarine sulcus, as well as within IPS. Our results identify the neural facets of numerical processing within a single paradigm and suggest that IPS is sensitive to distinctions between semantic and phonological/verbal, as well as visual and manual, facets of number representations.
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9
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Maimon A, Wald IY, Ben Oz M, Codron S, Netzer O, Heimler B, Amedi A. The Topo-Speech sensory substitution system as a method of conveying spatial information to the blind and vision impaired. Front Hum Neurosci 2023; 16:1058093. [PMID: 36776219 PMCID: PMC9909096 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2022.1058093] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/30/2022] [Accepted: 12/13/2022] [Indexed: 01/27/2023] Open
Abstract
Humans, like most animals, integrate sensory input in the brain from different sensory modalities. Yet humans are distinct in their ability to grasp symbolic input, which is interpreted into a cognitive mental representation of the world. This representation merges with external sensory input, providing modality integration of a different sort. This study evaluates the Topo-Speech algorithm in the blind and visually impaired. The system provides spatial information about the external world by applying sensory substitution alongside symbolic representations in a manner that corresponds with the unique way our brains acquire and process information. This is done by conveying spatial information, customarily acquired through vision, through the auditory channel, in a combination of sensory (auditory) features and symbolic language (named/spoken) features. The Topo-Speech sweeps the visual scene or image and represents objects' identity by employing naming in a spoken word and simultaneously conveying the objects' location by mapping the x-axis of the visual scene or image to the time it is announced and the y-axis by mapping the location to the pitch of the voice. This proof of concept study primarily explores the practical applicability of this approach in 22 visually impaired and blind individuals. The findings showed that individuals from both populations could effectively interpret and use the algorithm after a single training session. The blind showed an accuracy of 74.45%, while the visually impaired had an average accuracy of 72.74%. These results are comparable to those of the sighted, as shown in previous research, with all participants above chance level. As such, we demonstrate practically how aspects of spatial information can be transmitted through non-visual channels. To complement the findings, we weigh in on debates concerning models of spatial knowledge (the persistent, cumulative, or convergent models) and the capacity for spatial representation in the blind. We suggest the present study's findings support the convergence model and the scenario that posits the blind are capable of some aspects of spatial representation as depicted by the algorithm comparable to those of the sighted. Finally, we present possible future developments, implementations, and use cases for the system as an aid for the blind and visually impaired.
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Affiliation(s)
- Amber Maimon
- Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,The Ruth and Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,*Correspondence: Amber Maimon,
| | - Iddo Yehoshua Wald
- Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,The Ruth and Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
| | - Meshi Ben Oz
- Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,The Ruth and Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
| | - Sophie Codron
- Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,The Ruth and Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
| | - Ophir Netzer
- Gonda Brain Research Center, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Benedetta Heimler
- Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation (CATR), Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Amir Amedi
- Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,The Ruth and Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
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10
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Maimon A, Netzer O, Heimler B, Amedi A. Testing geometry and 3D perception in children following vision restoring cataract-removal surgery. Front Neurosci 2023; 16:962817. [PMID: 36711132 PMCID: PMC9879291 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2022.962817] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/06/2022] [Accepted: 12/19/2022] [Indexed: 01/13/2023] Open
Abstract
As neuroscience and rehabilitative techniques advance, age-old questions concerning the visual experience of those who gain sight after blindness, once thought to be philosophical alone, take center stage and become the target for scientific inquiries. In this study, we employ a battery of visual perception tasks to study the unique experience of a small group of children who have undergone vision-restoring cataract removal surgery as part of the Himalayan Cataract Project. We tested their abilities to perceive in three dimensions (3D) using a binocular rivalry task and the Brock string task, perceive visual illusions, use cross-modal mappings between touch and vision, and spatially group based on geometric cues. Some of the children in this study gained a sense of sight for the first time in their lives, having been born with bilateral congenital cataracts, while others suffered late-onset blindness in one eye alone. This study simultaneously supports yet raises further questions concerning Hubel and Wiesel's critical periods theory and provides additional insight into Molyneux's problem, the ability to correlate vision with touch quickly. We suggest that our findings present a relatively unexplored intermediate stage of 3D vision development. Importantly, we spotlight some essential geometrical perception visual abilities that strengthen the idea that spontaneous geometry intuitions arise independently from visual experience (and education), thus replicating and extending previous studies. We incorporate a new model, not previously explored, of testing children with congenital cataract removal surgeries who perform the task via vision. In contrast, previous work has explored these abilities in the congenitally blind via touch. Taken together, our findings provide insight into the development of what is commonly known as the visual system in the visually deprived and highlight the need to further empirically explore an amodal, task-based interpretation of specializations in the development and structure of the brain. Moreover, we propose a novel objective method, based on a simple binocular rivalry task and the Brock string task, for determining congenital (early) vs. late blindness where medical history and records are partial or lacking (e.g., as is often the case in cataract removal cases).
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Affiliation(s)
- Amber Maimon
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,The Ruth & Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,*Correspondence: Amber Maimon,
| | - Ophir Netzer
- Gonda Brain Research Center, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Benedetta Heimler
- Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation (CATR), Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Amir Amedi
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel,The Ruth & Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel
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11
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Conrad BN, Pollack C, Yeo DJ, Price GR. Structural and functional connectivity of the inferior temporal numeral area. Cereb Cortex 2022; 33:6152-6170. [PMID: 36587366 PMCID: PMC10183753 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhac492] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/31/2022] [Revised: 11/14/2022] [Accepted: 11/17/2022] [Indexed: 01/02/2023] Open
Abstract
A growing body of evidence suggests that in adults, there is a spatially consistent "inferior temporal numeral area" (ITNA) in the occipitotemporal cortex that appears to preferentially process Arabic digits relative to non-numerical symbols and objects. However, very little is known about why the ITNA is spatially segregated from regions that process other orthographic stimuli such as letters, and why it is spatially consistent across individuals. In the present study, we used diffusion-weighted imaging and functional magnetic resonance imaging to contrast structural and functional connectivity between left and right hemisphere ITNAs and a left hemisphere letter-preferring region. We found that the left ITNA had stronger structural and functional connectivity than the letter region to inferior parietal regions involved in numerical magnitude representation and arithmetic. Between hemispheres, the left ITNA showed stronger structural connectivity with the left inferior frontal gyrus (Broca's area), while the right ITNA showed stronger structural connectivity to the ipsilateral inferior parietal cortex and stronger functional coupling with the bilateral IPS. Based on their relative connectivity, our results suggest that the left ITNA may be more readily involved in mapping digits to verbal number representations, while the right ITNA may support the mapping of digits to quantity representations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Benjamin N Conrad
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, TN, 37203, USA
| | - Courtney Pollack
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, TN, 37203, USA
| | - Darren J Yeo
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, TN, 37203, USA.,Division of Psychology, School of Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, 48 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore, 639818
| | - Gavin R Price
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, TN, 37203, USA.,Department of Psychology, University of Exeter, Washington Singer Building Perry Road, Exeter, EX4 4QG, United Kingdom
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12
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Sabourin CJ, Merrikhi Y, Lomber SG. Do blind people hear better? Trends Cogn Sci 2022; 26:999-1012. [PMID: 36207258 DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2022.08.016] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/01/2022] [Revised: 08/22/2022] [Accepted: 08/25/2022] [Indexed: 01/12/2023]
Abstract
For centuries, anecdotal evidence such as the perfect pitch of the blind piano tuner or blind musician has supported the notion that individuals who have lost their sight early in life have superior hearing abilities compared with sighted people. Recently, auditory psychophysical and functional imaging studies have identified that specific auditory enhancements in the early blind can be linked to activation in extrastriate visual cortex, suggesting crossmodal plasticity. Furthermore, the nature of the sensory reorganization in occipital cortex supports the concept of a task-based functional cartography for the cerebral cortex rather than a sensory-based organization. In total, studies of early-blind individuals provide valuable insights into mechanisms of cortical plasticity and principles of cerebral organization.
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Affiliation(s)
- Carina J Sabourin
- Department of Physiology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3G 1Y6, Canada; Biological and Biomedical Engineering Graduate Program, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3G 1Y6, Canada
| | - Yaser Merrikhi
- Department of Physiology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3G 1Y6, Canada
| | - Stephen G Lomber
- Department of Physiology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3G 1Y6, Canada; Biological and Biomedical Engineering Graduate Program, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3G 1Y6, Canada; Department of Psychology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3G 1Y6, Canada; Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3G 1Y6, Canada.
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13
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Arbel R, Heimler B, Amedi A. Face shape processing via visual-to-auditory sensory substitution activates regions within the face processing networks in the absence of visual experience. Front Neurosci 2022; 16:921321. [PMID: 36263367 PMCID: PMC9576157 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2022.921321] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/15/2022] [Accepted: 09/05/2022] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Previous evidence suggests that visual experience is crucial for the emergence and tuning of the typical neural system for face recognition. To challenge this conclusion, we trained congenitally blind adults to recognize faces via visual-to-auditory sensory-substitution (SDD). Our results showed a preference for trained faces over other SSD-conveyed visual categories in the fusiform gyrus and in other known face-responsive-regions of the deprived ventral visual stream. We also observed a parametric modulation in the same cortical regions, for face orientation (upright vs. inverted) and face novelty (trained vs. untrained). Our results strengthen the conclusion that there is a predisposition for sensory-independent and computation-specific processing in specific cortical regions that can be retained in life-long sensory deprivation, independently of previous perceptual experience. They also highlight that if the right training is provided, such cortical preference maintains its tuning to what were considered visual-specific face features.
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Affiliation(s)
- Roni Arbel
- Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
- Faculty of Medicine, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
- Department of Pediatrics, Hadassah University Hospital-Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, Israel
- *Correspondence: Roni Arbel,
| | - Benedetta Heimler
- Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
- Ivcher School of Psychology, The Institute for Brain, Mind, and Technology, Reichman University, Herzeliya, Israel
- Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Amir Amedi
- Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
- Ivcher School of Psychology, The Institute for Brain, Mind, and Technology, Reichman University, Herzeliya, Israel
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Maimon A, Yizhar O, Buchs G, Heimler B, Amedi A. A case study in phenomenology of visual experience with retinal prosthesis versus visual-to-auditory sensory substitution. Neuropsychologia 2022; 173:108305. [PMID: 35752268 PMCID: PMC9297294 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2022.108305] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/01/2021] [Revised: 04/30/2022] [Accepted: 06/13/2022] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
The phenomenology of the blind has provided an age-old, unparalleled means of exploring the enigmatic link between the brain and mind. This paper delves into the unique phenomenological experience of a man who became blind in adulthood. He subsequently underwent both an Argus II retinal prosthesis implant and training, and extensive training on the EyeMusic visual to auditory sensory substitution device (SSD), thereby becoming the first reported case to date of dual proficiency with both devices. He offers a firsthand account into what he considers the great potential of combining sensory substitution devices with visual prostheses as part of a complete visual restoration protocol. While the Argus II retinal prosthesis alone provided him with immediate visual percepts by way of electrically stimulated phosphenes elicited by the device, the EyeMusic SSD requires extensive training from the onset. Yet following the extensive training program with the EyeMusic sensory substitution device, our subject reports that the sensory substitution device allowed him to experience a richer, more complex perceptual experience, that felt more "second nature" to him, while the Argus II prosthesis (which also requires training) did not allow him to achieve the same levels of automaticity and transparency. Following long-term use of the EyeMusic SSD, our subject reported that visual percepts representing mainly, but not limited to, colors portrayed by the EyeMusic SSD are elicited in association with auditory stimuli, indicating the acquisition of a high level of automaticity. Finally, the case study indicates an additive benefit to the combination of both devices on the user's subjective phenomenological visual experience.
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Affiliation(s)
- Amber Maimon
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel; The Ruth & Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel.
| | - Or Yizhar
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel; Department of Cognitive and Brain Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel; Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Research Group Adaptive Memory and Decision Making, Berlin, Germany; Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Max Planck Dahlem Campus of Cognition (MPDCC), Berlin, Germany
| | - Galit Buchs
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel; Department of Cognitive and Brain Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
| | - Benedetta Heimler
- Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation (CATR), Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Amir Amedi
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel; The Ruth & Meir Rosenthal Brain Imaging Center, Reichman University, Herzliya, Israel.
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15
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Chalas N, Karagiorgis A, Bamidis P, Paraskevopoulos E. The impact of musical training in symbolic and non-symbolic audiovisual judgements of magnitude. PLoS One 2022; 17:e0266165. [PMID: 35511806 PMCID: PMC9070945 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0266165] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/20/2021] [Accepted: 03/15/2022] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Quantity estimation can be represented in either an analog or symbolic manner and recent evidence now suggests that analog and symbolic representation of quantities interact. Nonetheless, those two representational forms of quantities may be enhanced by convergent multisensory information. Here, we elucidate those interactions using high-density electroencephalography (EEG) and an audiovisual oddball paradigm. Participants were presented simultaneous audiovisual tokens in which the co-varying pitch of tones was combined with the embedded cardinality of dot patterns. Incongruencies were elicited independently from symbolic and non-symbolic modality within the audio-visual percept, violating the newly acquired rule that “the higher the pitch of the tone, the larger the cardinality of the figure.” The effect of neural plasticity in symbolic and non-symbolic numerical representations of quantities was investigated through a cross-sectional design, comparing musicians to musically naïve controls. Individual’s cortical activity was reconstructed and statistically modeled for a predefined time-window of the evoked response (130–170 ms). To summarize, we show that symbolic and non-symbolic processing of magnitudes is re-organized in cortical space, with professional musicians showing altered activity in motor and temporal areas. Thus, we argue that the symbolic representation of quantities is altered through musical training.
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Affiliation(s)
- Nikos Chalas
- Institute for Biomagnetism and Biosignal analysis, University of Münster, Münster, Germany
- School of Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
| | - Alexandros Karagiorgis
- School of Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
| | - Panagiotis Bamidis
- School of Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
| | - Evangelos Paraskevopoulos
- School of Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
- Department of Psychology, University of Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus
- * E-mail:
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16
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Grey Matter Hypertrophy and Atrophy in Early-Blind Adolescents: A Surface-Based Morphometric Study. DISEASE MARKERS 2022; 2022:8550714. [PMID: 35557871 PMCID: PMC9090530 DOI: 10.1155/2022/8550714] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/05/2021] [Accepted: 04/09/2022] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
Objective This study is aimed at exploring the regional changes in brain cortical morphology (thickness, volume, and surface area) in the early-blind adolescents (EBAs) by using the surface-based morphometric (SBM) method. Methods High-resolution structural T1-weighted images (T1WI) of 23 early-blind adolescents (EBAs) and 21 age- and gender-matched normal-sighted controls (NSCs) were acquired. Structural indices, including cortical thickness (CT), cortical volume (CV), and surface area (SA), were analyzed by using FreeSurfer software, and the correlations between structural indices and the blindness duration were computed by Pearson correlation analysis. Results Compared to controls, EBAs had significantly reduced CV and SA mainly in the primary visual cortex (V1) and decreased CV in the left vision-related cortices (r-MFC). There were no regions that EBAs had a significantly larger CV or SA than NSCs. EBAs had significantly increased CT in the V1 and strongly involved the visual cortex (right lateral occipital gyrus, LOG.R) and the left superior temporal gyrus (STG.L), while it had decreased CT in the left superior parietal lobule (SPL.L) and the right lingual gyrus (LING.R). Additionally, no correlation was found between cortical morphometric measures and clinical variables in the EBA group. Conclusions SBM is a useful method for detecting human brain structural abnormalities in blindness. The results showed that these structural abnormalities in the visual cortex and visual-related areas outside the occipital cortex in the EBAs not only may be influenced by neurodevelopment, degeneration, plasticity, and so on but also involved the interaction of these factors after the early visual deprivation.
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Arbel R, Heimler B, Amedi A. Congenitally blind adults can learn to identify face-shapes via auditory sensory substitution and successfully generalize some of the learned features. Sci Rep 2022; 12:4330. [PMID: 35288597 PMCID: PMC8921184 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-08187-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/10/2021] [Accepted: 02/22/2022] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Unlike sighted individuals, congenitally blind individuals have little to no experience with face shapes. Instead, they rely on non-shape cues, such as voices, to perform character identification. The extent to which face-shape perception can be learned in adulthood via a different sensory modality (i.e., not vision) remains poorly explored. We used a visual-to-auditory Sensory Substitution Device (SSD) that enables conversion of visual images to the auditory modality while preserving their visual characteristics. Expert SSD users were systematically taught to identify cartoon faces via audition. Following a tailored training program lasting ~ 12 h, congenitally blind participants successfully identified six trained faces with high accuracy. Furthermore, they effectively generalized their identification to the untrained, inverted orientation of the learned faces. Finally, after completing the extensive 12-h training program, participants learned six new faces within 2 additional hours of training, suggesting internalization of face-identification processes. Our results document for the first time that facial features can be processed through audition, even in the absence of visual experience across the lifespan. Overall, these findings have important implications for both non-visual object recognition and visual rehabilitation practices and prompt the study of the neural processes underlying auditory face perception in the absence of vision.
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Dai R, Huang Z, Weng X, He S. Early visual exposure primes future cross-modal specialization of the fusiform face area in tactile face processing in the blind. Neuroimage 2022; 253:119062. [PMID: 35263666 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2022.119062] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/11/2021] [Revised: 02/21/2022] [Accepted: 03/05/2022] [Indexed: 10/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The fusiform face area (FFA) is a core cortical region for face information processing. Evidence suggests that its sensitivity to faces is largely innate and tuned by visual experience. However, how experience in different time windows shape the plasticity of the FFA remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the role of visual experience at different time points of an individual's early development in the cross-modal face specialization of the FFA. Participants (n = 74) were classified into five groups: congenital blind, early blind, late blind, low vision, and sighted control. Functional magnetic resonance imaging data were acquired when the participants haptically processed carved faces and other objects. Our results showed a robust and highly consistent face-selective activation in the FFA region in the early blind participants, invariant to size and level of abstraction of the face stimuli. The cross-modal face activation in the FFA was much less consistent in other groups. These results suggest that early visual experience primes cross-modal specialization of the FFA, and even after the absence of visual experience for more than 14 years in early blind participants, their FFA can engage in cross-modal processing of face information.
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Affiliation(s)
- Rui Dai
- State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
| | - Zirui Huang
- Center for Consciousness Science, Department of Anesthesiology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
| | - Xuchu Weng
- Institute for Brain Research and Rehabilitation, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510631, China.
| | - Sheng He
- State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; CAS Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Shanghai, 20031, China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China; School of Artificial Intelligence, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
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19
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The Benefits of Music Listening for Induced State Anxiety: Behavioral and Physiological Evidence. Brain Sci 2021; 11:brainsci11101332. [PMID: 34679397 PMCID: PMC8533701 DOI: 10.3390/brainsci11101332] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/21/2021] [Revised: 09/24/2021] [Accepted: 09/24/2021] [Indexed: 02/05/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Some clinical studies have indicated that neutral and happy music may relieve state anxiety. However, the brain mechanisms by which these effective interventions in music impact state anxiety remain unknown. METHODS In this study, we selected music with clinical effects for therapy, and 62 subjects were included using the evoked anxiety paradigm. After evoking anxiety with a visual stimulus, all subjects were randomly divided into three groups (listening to happy music, neutral music and a blank stimulus), and EEG signals were acquired. RESULTS We found that different emotional types of music might have different mechanisms in state anxiety interventions. Neutral music had the effect of alleviating state anxiety. The brain mechanisms supported that neutral music ameliorating state anxiety was associated with decreased power spectral density of the occipital lobe and increased brain functional connectivity between the occipital lobe and frontal lobe. Happy music also had the effect of alleviating state anxiety, and the brain mechanism was associated with enhanced brain functional connectivity between the occipital lobe and right temporal lobe. CONCLUSIONS This study may be important for a deep understanding of the mechanisms associated with state anxiety music interventions and may further contribute to future clinical treatment using nonpharmaceutical interventions.
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Sakai H, Ueda S, Ueno K, Kumada T. Neuroplastic Reorganization Induced by Sensory Augmentation for Self-Localization During Locomotion. FRONTIERS IN NEUROERGONOMICS 2021; 2:691993. [PMID: 38235242 PMCID: PMC10790880 DOI: 10.3389/fnrgo.2021.691993] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/07/2021] [Accepted: 07/21/2021] [Indexed: 01/19/2024]
Abstract
Sensory skills can be augmented through training and technological support. This process is underpinned by neural plasticity in the brain. We previously demonstrated that auditory-based sensory augmentation can be used to assist self-localization during locomotion. However, the neural mechanisms underlying this phenomenon remain unclear. Here, by using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we aimed to identify the neuroplastic reorganization induced by sensory augmentation training for self-localization during locomotion. We compared activation in response to auditory cues for self-localization before, the day after, and 1 month after 8 days of sensory augmentation training in a simulated driving environment. Self-localization accuracy improved after sensory augmentation training, compared with the control (normal driving) condition; importantly, sensory augmentation training resulted in auditory responses not only in temporal auditory areas but also in higher-order somatosensory areas extending to the supramarginal gyrus and the parietal operculum. This sensory reorganization had disappeared by 1 month after the end of the training. These results suggest that the use of auditory cues for self-localization during locomotion relies on multimodality in higher-order somatosensory areas, despite substantial evidence that information for self-localization during driving is estimated from visual cues on the proximal part of the road. Our findings imply that the involvement of higher-order somatosensory, rather than visual, areas is crucial for acquiring augmented sensory skills for self-localization during locomotion.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hiroyuki Sakai
- Human Science Laboratory, Toyota Central R&D Laboratories, Inc., Tokyo, Japan
| | - Sayako Ueda
- TOYOTA Collaboration Center, RIKEN Center for Brain Science, Wako, Japan
| | - Kenichi Ueno
- Support Unit for Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, RIKEN Center for Brain Science, Wako, Japan
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21
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Topography of Visual Features in the Human Ventral Visual Pathway. Neurosci Bull 2021; 37:1454-1468. [PMID: 34215969 DOI: 10.1007/s12264-021-00734-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/12/2020] [Accepted: 02/24/2021] [Indexed: 10/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Visual object recognition in humans and nonhuman primates is achieved by the ventral visual pathway (ventral occipital-temporal cortex, VOTC), which shows a well-documented object domain structure. An on-going question is what type of information is processed in the higher-order VOTC that underlies such observations, with recent evidence suggesting effects of certain visual features. Combining computational vision models, fMRI experiment using a parametric-modulation approach, and natural image statistics of common objects, we depicted the neural distribution of a comprehensive set of visual features in the VOTC, identifying voxel sensitivities with specific feature sets across geometry/shape, Fourier power, and color. The visual feature combination pattern in the VOTC is significantly explained by their relationships to different types of response-action computation (fight-or-flight, navigation, and manipulation), as derived from behavioral ratings and natural image statistics. These results offer a comprehensive visual feature map in the VOTC and a plausible theoretical explanation as a mapping onto different types of downstream response-action systems.
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22
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Friedmann N, Haluts N, Levy D. Dysnumeria in Sign Language: Impaired Construction of the Decimal Structure in Reading Multidigit Numbers in a Deaf ISL Signer. Front Psychol 2021; 12:649109. [PMID: 34267698 PMCID: PMC8276863 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.649109] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/06/2021] [Accepted: 04/29/2021] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
We report on the first in-depth analysis of a specific type of dysnumeria, number-reading deficit, in sign language. The participant, Nomi, is a 45-year-old signer of Israeli Sign Language (ISL). In reading multidigit numbers (reading-then-signing written numbers, the counterpart of reading aloud in spoken language), Nomi made mainly decimal, number-structure errors- reading the correct digits in an incorrect (smaller) decimal class, mainly in longer numbers of 5-6-digits. A unique property of ISL allowed us to rule out the numeric-visual analysis as the source of Nomi's dysnumeria: In ISL, when the multidigit number signifies the number of objects, it is signed with a decimal structure, which is marked morphologically (e.g., 84 → Eight-Tens Four); but a parallel system exists (e.g., for height, age, bus numbers), in which multidigit numbers are signed non-decimally, as a sequence of number-signs (e.g., 84 → Eight, Four). When Nomi read and signed the exact same numbers, but this time non-decimally, she performed significantly better. Additional tests supported the conclusion that her early numeric-visual abilities are intact: she showed flawless detection of differences in length, digit-order, or identity in same-different tasks. Her decimal errors did not result from a number-structure deficit in the phonological-sign output either (no decimal errors in repeating the same numbers, nor in signing multidigit numbers written as Hebrew words). Nomi had similar errors of conversion to the decimal structure in number comprehension (number-size comparison tasks), suggesting that her deficit is in a component shared by reading and comprehension. We also compared Nomi's number reading to her reading and signing of 406 Hebrew words. Nomi's word reading was in the high range of the normal performance of hearing controls and of deaf signers and significantly better than her multidigit number reading, demonstrating a dissociation between number reading, which was impaired, and word reading, which was spared. These results point to a specific type of dysnumeria in the number-frame generation for written multidigit numbers, whereby the conversion from written multidigit numbers to the abstract decimal structure is impaired, affecting both reading and comprehension. The results support abstract, non-verbal decimal structure generation that is shared by reading and comprehension, and also suggest the existence of a non-decimal number-reading route.
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Affiliation(s)
- Naama Friedmann
- Language and Brain Lab, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel
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23
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Netzer O, Heimler B, Shur A, Behor T, Amedi A. Backward spatial perception can be augmented through a novel visual-to-auditory sensory substitution algorithm. Sci Rep 2021; 11:11944. [PMID: 34099756 PMCID: PMC8184900 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-88595-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/22/2020] [Accepted: 02/08/2021] [Indexed: 11/23/2022] Open
Abstract
Can humans extend and augment their natural perceptions during adulthood? Here, we address this fascinating question by investigating the extent to which it is possible to successfully augment visual spatial perception to include the backward spatial field (a region where humans are naturally blind) via other sensory modalities (i.e., audition). We thus developed a sensory-substitution algorithm, the “Topo-Speech” which conveys identity of objects through language, and their exact locations via vocal-sound manipulations, namely two key features of visual spatial perception. Using two different groups of blindfolded sighted participants, we tested the efficacy of this algorithm to successfully convey location of objects in the forward or backward spatial fields following ~ 10 min of training. Results showed that blindfolded sighted adults successfully used the Topo-Speech to locate objects on a 3 × 3 grid either positioned in front of them (forward condition), or behind their back (backward condition). Crucially, performances in the two conditions were entirely comparable. This suggests that novel spatial sensory information conveyed via our existing sensory systems can be successfully encoded to extend/augment human perceptions. The implications of these results are discussed in relation to spatial perception, sensory augmentation and sensory rehabilitation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ophir Netzer
- The Cognitive Science Program, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
| | - Benedetta Heimler
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Herzeliya, Israel.,Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Jerusalem, Israel.,Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation (CATR), Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Amir Shur
- The Cognitive Science Program, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
| | - Tomer Behor
- The Cognitive Science Program, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
| | - Amir Amedi
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Herzeliya, Israel. .,Department of Medical Neurobiology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Hadassah Ein-Kerem, Jerusalem, Israel.
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Abstract
Strong foundational skills in mathematical problem solving, acquired in early childhood, are critical not only for success in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematical (STEM) fields but also for quantitative reasoning in everyday life. The acquisition of mathematical skills relies on protracted interactive specialization of functional brain networks across development. Using a systems neuroscience approach, this review synthesizes emerging perspectives on neurodevelopmental pathways of mathematical learning, highlighting the functional brain architecture that supports these processes and sources of heterogeneity in mathematical skill acquisition. We identify the core neural building blocks of numerical cognition, anchored in the posterior parietal and ventral temporal-occipital cortices, and describe how memory and cognitive control systems, anchored in the medial temporal lobe and prefrontal cortex, help scaffold mathematical skill development. We highlight how interactive specialization of functional circuits influences mathematical learning across different stages of development. Functional and structural brain integrity and plasticity associated with math learning can be examined using an individual differences approach to better understand sources of heterogeneity in learning, including cognitive, affective, motivational, and sociocultural factors. Our review emphasizes the dynamic role of neurodevelopmental processes in mathematical learning and cognitive development more generally.
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Affiliation(s)
- Vinod Menon
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, USA
- Department of Neurology and Neurological Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, USA
- Stanford Neuroscience Institute, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, USA
- Symbolic Systems Program, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, USA
| | - Hyesang Chang
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, USA
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Buchs G, Haimler B, Kerem M, Maidenbaum S, Braun L, Amedi A. A self-training program for sensory substitution devices. PLoS One 2021; 16:e0250281. [PMID: 33905446 PMCID: PMC8078811 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0250281] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/22/2020] [Accepted: 04/01/2021] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Sensory Substitution Devices (SSDs) convey visual information through audition or touch, targeting blind and visually impaired individuals. One bottleneck towards adopting SSDs in everyday life by blind users, is the constant dependency on sighted instructors throughout the learning process. Here, we present a proof-of-concept for the efficacy of an online self-training program developed for learning the basics of the EyeMusic visual-to-auditory SSD tested on sighted blindfolded participants. Additionally, aiming to identify the best training strategy to be later re-adapted for the blind, we compared multisensory vs. unisensory as well as perceptual vs. descriptive feedback approaches. To these aims, sighted participants performed identical SSD-stimuli identification tests before and after ~75 minutes of self-training on the EyeMusic algorithm. Participants were divided into five groups, differing by the feedback delivered during training: auditory-descriptive, audio-visual textual description, audio-visual perceptual simultaneous and interleaved, and a control group which had no training. At baseline, before any EyeMusic training, participants SSD objects’ identification was significantly above chance, highlighting the algorithm’s intuitiveness. Furthermore, self-training led to a significant improvement in accuracy between pre- and post-training tests in each of the four feedback groups versus control, though no significant difference emerged among those groups. Nonetheless, significant correlations between individual post-training success rates and various learning measures acquired during training, suggest a trend for an advantage of multisensory vs. unisensory feedback strategies, while no trend emerged for perceptual vs. descriptive strategies. The success at baseline strengthens the conclusion that cross-modal correspondences facilitate learning, given SSD algorithms are based on such correspondences. Additionally, and crucially, the results highlight the feasibility of self-training for the first stages of SSD learning, and suggest that for these initial stages, unisensory training, easily implemented also for blind and visually impaired individuals, may suffice. Together, these findings will potentially boost the use of SSDs for rehabilitation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Galit Buchs
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute For Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzeliya, Israel
- Department of Cognitive Science, Faculty of Humanities, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
- * E-mail: (AA); (GB)
| | - Benedetta Haimler
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute For Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzeliya, Israel
- Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation (CATR), The Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Menachem Kerem
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute For Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzeliya, Israel
| | - Shachar Maidenbaum
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute For Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzeliya, Israel
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Ben Gurion University, Beersheba, Israel
| | - Liraz Braun
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute For Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzeliya, Israel
- Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel
| | - Amir Amedi
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute For Brain, Cognition & Technology, The Baruch Ivcher School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), Herzeliya, Israel
- * E-mail: (AA); (GB)
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Hofstetter S, Zuiderbaan W, Heimler B, Dumoulin SO, Amedi A. Topographic maps and neural tuning for sensory substitution dimensions learned in adulthood in a congenital blind subject. Neuroimage 2021; 235:118029. [PMID: 33836269 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2021.118029] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/20/2020] [Revised: 01/18/2021] [Accepted: 03/30/2021] [Indexed: 01/28/2023] Open
Abstract
Topographic maps, a key principle of brain organization, emerge during development. It remains unclear, however, whether topographic maps can represent a new sensory experience learned in adulthood. MaMe, a congenitally blind individual, has been extensively trained in adulthood for perception of a 2D auditory-space (soundscape) where the y- and x-axes are represented by pitch and time, respectively. Using population receptive field mapping we found neural populations tuned topographically to pitch, not only in the auditory cortices but also in the parietal and occipito-temporal cortices. Topographic neural tuning to time was revealed in the parietal and occipito-temporal cortices. Some of these maps were found to represent both axes concurrently, enabling MaMe to represent unique locations in the soundscape space. This case study provides proof of concept for the existence of topographic maps tuned to the newly learned soundscape dimensions. These results suggest that topographic maps can be adapted or recycled in adulthood to represent novel sensory experiences.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shir Hofstetter
- Spinoza Centre for Neuroimaging, Meibergdreef 75, Amsterdam, BK 1105 Netherlands.
| | - Wietske Zuiderbaan
- Spinoza Centre for Neuroimaging, Meibergdreef 75, Amsterdam, BK 1105 Netherlands
| | - Benedetta Heimler
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Mind & Technology, School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya, P.O. Box 167, Herzliya 46150, Israel; Center of Advanced Technologies in Rehabilitation (CATR), Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel
| | - Serge O Dumoulin
- Spinoza Centre for Neuroimaging, Meibergdreef 75, Amsterdam, BK 1105 Netherlands; Department of Experimental and Applied Psychology, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, BT 1181, Netherlands; Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, Utrecht, CS 3584, Netherlands.
| | - Amir Amedi
- The Baruch Ivcher Institute for Brain, Mind & Technology, School of Psychology, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya, P.O. Box 167, Herzliya 46150, Israel.
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Dotan D, Eliahou O, Cohen S. Serial and syntactic processing in the visual analysis of multi-digit numbers. Cortex 2020; 134:162-180. [PMID: 33279810 DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2020.10.012] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/15/2020] [Revised: 09/30/2020] [Accepted: 10/22/2020] [Indexed: 11/17/2022]
Abstract
The visual analysis of letter strings and digit strings is done by two separate cognitive processes. Recent studies have hypothesized that these processes are not only separate but also qualitatively different, in that they may encode information specific to numbers or to words. To examine this hypothesis and to shed further light on the visual analysis of numbers, we asked adults to read aloud multi-digit strings presented to them for brief durations. Their performance was better in digits on the number's left side than in digits farther to the right, with better performance in the two outer digits than their neighbors. This indicates the digits were processed serially, from left to right. Visual similarity of digits increased the likelihood of errors, and when a digit migrated to an incorrect position, it was most often to an adjacent location. Interestingly, the positions of 0 and 1 were encoded better than the positions of 2-9, and 2-9 were identified better when they were next to 0 or 1. To accommodate these findings, we propose a detailed model for the visual analysis of digit strings. The model assumes imperfect digit detectors in which a digit's visual information leaks to adjacent locations, and a compensation mechanism that inhibits this leakage. Crucially, the compensating inhibition is stronger for 0 and 1 than for the digits 2-9, presumably because of the importance of 0 and 1 in the number system. This sensitivity to 0 and 1 makes the visual analyzer specifically adapted to numbers, not words, and may be one of the brain's reasons to implement the visual analysis of numbers and words in two separate cognitive processes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dror Dotan
- Mathematical Thinking Lab, School of Education and School of Neuroscience, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 6997801, Israel.
| | - Ofir Eliahou
- Mathematical Thinking Lab, School of Education and School of Neuroscience, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 6997801, Israel
| | - Sharon Cohen
- Mathematical Thinking Lab, School of Education and School of Neuroscience, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 6997801, Israel
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Crollen V, Collignon O. How visual is the « number sense »? Insights from the blind. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 2020; 118:290-297. [PMID: 32711006 DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2020.07.022] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/03/2019] [Revised: 06/18/2020] [Accepted: 07/20/2020] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
Abstract
Is vision a necessary building block for the foundations of mathematical cognition? A straightforward model to test the causal role visual experience plays in the development of numerical abilities is to study people born without sight. In this review we will demonstrate that congenitally blind people can develop numerical abilities that equal or even surpass those of sighted individuals, despite representing numbers using a qualitatively different representational format. We will also show that numerical thinking in blind people maps onto regions typically involved in visuo-spatial processing in the sighted, highlighting how intrinsic computational biases may constrain the reorganization of numerical networks in case of early visual deprivation. More generally, we will illustrate how the study of arithmetic abilities in congenitally blind people represents a compelling model to understand how sensory experience scaffolds the development of higher-level cognitive representations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Virginie Crollen
- Institute of Psychology (IPSY) and Institute of Neuroscience (IoNS), Université Catholique de Louvain, Place Cardinal Mercier 10, 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium.
| | - Olivier Collignon
- Institute of Psychology (IPSY) and Institute of Neuroscience (IoNS), Université Catholique de Louvain, Place Cardinal Mercier 10, 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium; Center for Mind/Brain Sciences, University of Trento, Trento, Italy.
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29
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Dotan D, Dehaene S. Parallel and serial processes in number-to-quantity conversion. Cognition 2020; 204:104387. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2020.104387] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/28/2019] [Revised: 05/15/2020] [Accepted: 06/22/2020] [Indexed: 01/29/2023]
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30
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Kanjlia S, Pant R, Bedny M. Sensitive Period for Cognitive Repurposing of Human Visual Cortex. Cereb Cortex 2020; 29:3993-4005. [PMID: 30418533 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhy280] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/09/2018] [Revised: 09/03/2018] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Studies of sensory loss are a model for understanding the functional flexibility of human cortex. In congenital blindness, subsets of visual cortex are recruited during higher-cognitive tasks, such as language and math tasks. Is such dramatic functional repurposing possible throughout the lifespan or restricted to sensitive periods in development? We compared visual cortex function in individuals who lost their vision as adults (after age 17) to congenitally blind and sighted blindfolded adults. Participants took part in resting-state and task-based fMRI scans during which they solved math equations of varying difficulty and judged the meanings of sentences. Blindness at any age caused "visual" cortices to synchronize with specific frontoparietal networks at rest. However, in task-based data, visual cortices showed regional specialization for math and language and load-dependent activity only in congenital blindness. Thus, despite the presence of long-range functional connectivity, cognitive repurposing of human cortex is limited by sensitive periods.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shipra Kanjlia
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
| | - Rashi Pant
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
| | - Marina Bedny
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
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31
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Heimler B, Amedi A. Are critical periods reversible in the adult brain? Insights on cortical specializations based on sensory deprivation studies. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 2020; 116:494-507. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2020.06.034] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/07/2019] [Revised: 06/07/2020] [Accepted: 06/25/2020] [Indexed: 02/06/2023]
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32
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Conrad BN, Wilkey ED, Yeo DJ, Price GR. Network topology of symbolic and nonsymbolic number comparison. Netw Neurosci 2020; 4:714-745. [PMID: 32885123 PMCID: PMC7462424 DOI: 10.1162/netn_a_00144] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/27/2019] [Accepted: 05/08/2020] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Studies of brain activity during number processing suggest symbolic and nonsymbolic numerical stimuli (e.g., Arabic digits and dot arrays) engage both shared and distinct neural mechanisms. However, the extent to which number format influences large-scale functional network organization is unknown. In this study, using 7 Tesla MRI, we adopted a network neuroscience approach to characterize the whole-brain functional architecture supporting symbolic and nonsymbolic number comparison in 33 adults. Results showed the degree of global modularity was similar for both formats. The symbolic format, however, elicited stronger community membership among auditory regions, whereas for nonsymbolic, stronger membership was observed within and between cingulo-opercular/salience network and basal ganglia communities. The right posterior inferior temporal gyrus, left intraparietal sulcus, and two regions in the right ventromedial occipital cortex demonstrated robust differences between formats in terms of their community membership, supporting prior findings that these areas are differentially engaged based on number format. Furthermore, a unified fronto-parietal/dorsal attention community in the nonsymbolic condition was fractionated into two components in the symbolic condition. Taken together, these results reveal a pattern of overlapping and distinct network architectures for symbolic and nonsymbolic number processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Benjamin N. Conrad
- Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
- Vanderbilt Brain Institute, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
| | - Eric D. Wilkey
- Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
- Vanderbilt Brain Institute, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
- Brain & Mind Institute, Western University, London, ON, Canada
| | - Darren J. Yeo
- Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
- Vanderbilt Brain Institute, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
- Division of Psychology, School of Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
| | - Gavin R. Price
- Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
- Vanderbilt Brain Institute, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
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33
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Chebat DR, Schneider FC, Ptito M. Spatial Competence and Brain Plasticity in Congenital Blindness via Sensory Substitution Devices. Front Neurosci 2020; 14:815. [PMID: 32848575 PMCID: PMC7406645 DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2020.00815] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/12/2020] [Accepted: 07/10/2020] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
Abstract
In congenital blindness (CB), tactile, and auditory information can be reinterpreted by the brain to compensate for visual information through mechanisms of brain plasticity triggered by training. Visual deprivation does not cause a cognitive spatial deficit since blind people are able to acquire spatial knowledge about the environment. However, this spatial competence takes longer to achieve but is eventually reached through training-induced plasticity. Congenitally blind individuals can further improve their spatial skills with the extensive use of sensory substitution devices (SSDs), either visual-to-tactile or visual-to-auditory. Using a combination of functional and anatomical neuroimaging techniques, our recent work has demonstrated the impact of spatial training with both visual to tactile and visual to auditory SSDs on brain plasticity, cortical processing, and the achievement of certain forms of spatial competence. The comparison of performances between CB and sighted people using several different sensory substitution devices in perceptual and sensory-motor tasks uncovered the striking ability of the brain to rewire itself during perceptual learning and to interpret novel sensory information even during adulthood. We discuss here the implications of these findings for helping blind people in navigation tasks and to increase their accessibility to both real and virtual environments.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel-Robert Chebat
- Visual and Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory (VCN Lab), Department of Psychology, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Ariel University, Ariel, Israel
- Navigation and Accessibility Research Center of Ariel University (NARCA), Ariel, Israel
| | - Fabien C. Schneider
- Department of Radiology, University of Lyon, Saint-Etienne, France
- Neuroradiology Unit, University Hospital of Saint-Etienne, Saint-Etienne, France
| | - Maurice Ptito
- BRAIN Lab, Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Chaire de Recherche Harland Sanders en Sciences de la Vision, École d’Optométrie, Université de Montréal, Montréal, QC, Canada
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34
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Early dissociation of numbers and letters in the human brain. Cortex 2020; 130:192-202. [PMID: 32679407 DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2020.03.030] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/17/2018] [Revised: 03/21/2019] [Accepted: 03/03/2020] [Indexed: 11/23/2022]
Abstract
Numbers and letters are culturally created symbols which are learned through repeated training. This experience leads to a functional specialization of the perceptual system of our brain. Recent evidence suggests a neural dissociation between these two symbols. While previous literature has shown that letters elicit a left lateralized neural response, new studies suggest that numbers elicit preferentially a bilateral or right lateralized response. However, the time course of the neural patterns that characterize this dissociation is still underspecified. In the present study, we investigated with magnetoencephalography (MEG) the spatio-temporal dynamics of the neural response generated by numbers, letters and perceptually matched false fonts presented visually. Twenty-five healthy adults were recorded while participants performed a dot detection task. By including two experiments, we were able to study the effects of single characters as well as those of strings of characters. The signal analysis was focused on the event related fields (ERF) of the MEG signal in the sensors and in the source space. The main results of our study showed an early (<200 msec) preferential dissociation between single numbers and single letters on occipito-temporal sensors. When comparing strings of numbers and pseudowords, they differed also over prefrontal regions of the brain. These data offer a new example of acquired category-specific responses in the human brain.
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35
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The “Inferior Temporal Numeral Area” distinguishes numerals from other character categories during passive viewing: A representational similarity analysis. Neuroimage 2020; 214:116716. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.116716] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/10/2019] [Revised: 02/26/2020] [Accepted: 03/03/2020] [Indexed: 12/28/2022] Open
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36
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Developmental alterations of the numerical processing networks in the brain. Brain Cogn 2020; 141:105551. [PMID: 32088489 DOI: 10.1016/j.bandc.2020.105551] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/19/2019] [Revised: 01/30/2020] [Accepted: 02/14/2020] [Indexed: 02/02/2023]
Abstract
Neuroimaging studies revealed that number perception is mainly located in parietal cortex. Although controversial, it was suggested that number is processed in the frontal lobe in childhood and in the parietal cortex in adulthood. The purpose of this study is to investigate developmental differences in the neural correlates of number representation with fMRI. Sixteen healthy young adults (age:21.69 ± 0.79) and 15 healthy children (age:11.87 ± 0.52) performed a numerosity comparison paradigm which consists of two numerical conditions with two difficulty levels. Adults showed broad parietal cortex activation, as well as activation in the inferior parietal lobes, dorsolateral and medial prefrontal cortex, anterior and posterior cingulate cortex, and peristriate cortex (PC) during number processing. Children showed activations in the intraparietal sulcus and PC. Group differences were observed in the posterior insula, fusiform gyrus, and PC whose coordinates correspond to the number form area (NFA). Region of interest analysis was performed for these clusters to get the time series of hemodynamic responses which were estimated with a finite impulse response function. In contrast to the prominent frontoparietal shift theory, no age-related differences were observed in the frontoparietal regions. Overall, the presented study suggests developmental changes in the brain's number processing revolving around the NFA.
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37
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A brain connectivity characterization of children with different levels of mathematical achievement based on graph metrics. PLoS One 2020; 15:e0227613. [PMID: 31951604 PMCID: PMC6968862 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0227613] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/10/2019] [Accepted: 12/21/2019] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Recent studies aiming to facilitate mathematical skill development in primary school children have explored the electrophysiological characteristics associated with different levels of arithmetic achievement. The present work introduces an alternative EEG signal characterization using graph metrics and, based on such features, a classification analysis using a decision tree model. This proposal aims to identify group differences in brain connectivity networks with respect to mathematical skills in elementary school children. The methods of analysis utilized were signal-processing (EEG artifact removal, Laplacian filtering, and magnitude square coherence measurement) and the characterization (Graph metrics) and classification (Decision Tree) of EEG signals recorded during performance of a numerical comparison task. Our results suggest that the analysis of quantitative EEG frequency-band parameters can be used successfully to discriminate several levels of arithmetic achievement. Specifically, the most significant results showed an accuracy of 80.00% (α band), 78.33% (δ band), and 76.67% (θ band) in differentiating high-skilled participants from low-skilled ones, averaged-skilled subjects from all others, and averaged-skilled participants from low-skilled ones, respectively. The use of a decision tree tool during the classification stage allows the identification of several brain areas that seem to be more specialized in numerical processing.
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38
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Ueda S, Sakai H, Kumada T. A Novel Approach to Sensorimotor Skill Acquisition Utilizing Sensory Substitution: A Driving Simulation Study. Sci Rep 2019; 9:17886. [PMID: 31784667 PMCID: PMC6884475 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-54324-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/10/2018] [Accepted: 10/30/2019] [Indexed: 11/29/2022] Open
Abstract
The aim of this study is to demonstrate the potential of sensory substitution/augmentation (SS/A) techniques for driver assistance systems in a simulated driving environment. Using a group-comparison design, we examined lane-keeping skill acquisition in a driving simulator that can provide information regarding vehicle lateral position by changing the binaural balance of auditory white noise delivered to the driver. Consequently, lane-keeping accuracy was significantly degraded when the lower visual scene (proximal part of the road) was occluded, suggesting it conveyed critical visual information necessary for lane keeping. After 40 minutes of training with auditory cueing of vehicle lateral position, lane-keeping accuracy returned to the baseline (normal driving) level. This indicates that auditory cueing can compensate for the loss of visual information. Taken together, our data suggest that auditory cueing of vehicle lateral position is sufficient for lane-keeping skill acquisition and that SS/A techniques can potentially be used for the development of driver assistance systems, particularly for situations where immediate time-sensitive actions are required in response to rapidly changing sensory information. Although this study is the first to apply SS/A techniques to driver assistance, further studies are however required to establish the generalizability of the findings to real-world settings.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sayako Ueda
- TOYOTA Collaboration Center, RIKEN Center for Brain Science, Wako, Japan
| | | | - Takatsune Kumada
- TOYOTA Collaboration Center, RIKEN Center for Brain Science, Wako, Japan.,Graduate School of Informatics, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
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39
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Abstract
The emergence of visual cortex specialization for culturally acquired characters like letters and digits, both arbitrary shapes related to specific cognitive domains, is yet unclear. Here, 20 young children (6.12 years old) were tested with a frequency‐tagging paradigm coupled with electroencephalogram recordings to assess discrimination responses of letters from digits and vice‐versa. One category of stimuli (e.g., letters) was periodically inserted (1/5) in streams of the other category (e.g., digits) presented at a fast rate (6 Hz). Results show clear right‐lateralized discrimination responses at 6 Hz/5 for digits within letters, and a trend for left‐lateralization for letters. These results support an early developmental emergence of ventral occipito‐temporal cortex specialization for visual recognition of digits and letters, potentially in relation with relevant coactivated brain networks.
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40
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Zhang C, Lee TMC, Fu Y, Ren C, Chan CCH, Tao Q. Properties of cross-modal occipital responses in early blindness: An ALE meta-analysis. NEUROIMAGE-CLINICAL 2019; 24:102041. [PMID: 31677587 PMCID: PMC6838549 DOI: 10.1016/j.nicl.2019.102041] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/12/2019] [Revised: 09/20/2019] [Accepted: 10/17/2019] [Indexed: 11/10/2022]
Abstract
ALE meta-analysis reveals distributed brain networks for object and spatial functions in individuals with early blindness. ALE contrast analysis reveals specific activations in the left cuneus and lingual gyrus for language function, suggesting a reverse hierarchical organization of the visual cortex for early blind individuals. The findings contribute to visual rehabilitation in blind individuals by revealing the function-dependent and sensory-independent networks during nonvisual processing.
Cross-modal occipital responses appear to be essential for nonvisual processing in individuals with early blindness. However, it is not clear whether the recruitment of occipital regions depends on functional domain or sensory modality. The current study utilized a coordinate-based meta-analysis to identify the distinct brain regions involved in the functional domains of object, spatial/motion, and language processing and the common brain regions involved in both auditory and tactile modalities in individuals with early blindness. Following the PRISMA guidelines, a total of 55 studies were included in the meta-analysis. The specific analyses revealed the brain regions that are consistently recruited for each function, such as the dorsal fronto-parietal network for spatial function and ventral occipito-temporal network for object function. This is consistent with the literature, suggesting that the two visual streams are preserved in early blind individuals. The contrast analyses found specific activations in the left cuneus and lingual gyrus for language function. This finding is novel and suggests a reverse hierarchical organization of the visual cortex for early blind individuals. The conjunction analyses found common activations in the right middle temporal gyrus, right precuneus and a left parieto-occipital region. Clinically, this work contributes to visual rehabilitation in early blind individuals by revealing the function-dependent and sensory-independent networks during nonvisual processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Caiyun Zhang
- Psychology Department, School of Medicine, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, China
| | - Tatia M C Lee
- Laboratory of Neuropsychology, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, CHINA; Laboratory of Cognitive Affective Neuroscience, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, CHINA; The Affiliated Brain Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, China
| | - Yunwei Fu
- Guangdong-Hongkong-Macau Institute of CNS Regeneration, Ministry of Education CNS Regeneration Collaborative Joint Laboratory, Jinan University, Guangzhou, 510632, China
| | - Chaoran Ren
- Guangdong-Hongkong-Macau Institute of CNS Regeneration, Ministry of Education CNS Regeneration Collaborative Joint Laboratory, Jinan University, Guangzhou, 510632, China; Guangdong key Laboratory of Brain Function and Diseases, Jinan University, Guangzhou, 510632, China; Co-innovation Center of Neuroregeneration, Nantong University, Nantong, 226001, China; Center for Brain Science and Brain-Inspired Intelligence, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Guangzhou, China
| | - Chetwyn C H Chan
- Applied Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, Department of Rehabilitation Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, CHINA.
| | - Qian Tao
- Psychology Department, School of Medicine, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, China; Center for Brain Science and Brain-Inspired Intelligence, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Guangzhou, China.
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41
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Separate mechanisms for number reading and word reading: Evidence from selective impairments. Cortex 2019; 114:176-192. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2018.05.010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/01/2017] [Revised: 03/23/2018] [Accepted: 05/04/2018] [Indexed: 11/21/2022]
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42
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Rączy K, Urbańczyk A, Korczyk M, Szewczyk JM, Sumera E, Szwed M. Orthographic Priming in Braille Reading as Evidence for Task-specific Reorganization in the Ventral Visual Cortex of the Congenitally Blind. J Cogn Neurosci 2019; 31:1065-1078. [PMID: 30938589 DOI: 10.1162/jocn_a_01407] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/04/2022]
Abstract
The task-specific principle asserts that, following deafness or blindness, the deprived cortex is reorganized in a manner such that the task of a given area is preserved even though its input modality has been switched. Accordingly, tactile reading engages the ventral occipitotemporal cortex (vOT) in the blind in a similar way to regular reading in the sighted. Others, however, show that the vOT of the blind processes spoken sentence structure, which suggests that the task-specific principle might not apply to vOT. The strongest evidence for the vOT's engagement in sighted reading comes from orthographic repetition-suppression studies. Here, congenitally blind adults were tested in an fMRI repetition-suppression paradigm. Results reveal a double dissociation, with tactile orthographic priming in the vOT and auditory priming in general language areas. Reconciling our finding with other evidence, we propose that the vOT in the blind serves multiple functions, one of which, orthographic processing, overlaps with its function in the sighted.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | | | | | - Ewa Sumera
- Institute for the Blind and Partially Sighted Children, Krakow, Poland
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43
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Emerging neural specialization of the ventral occipitotemporal cortex to characters through phonological association learning in preschool children. Neuroimage 2019; 189:813-831. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.01.046] [Citation(s) in RCA: 26] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/22/2018] [Revised: 12/21/2018] [Accepted: 01/21/2019] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
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44
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A distinct cortical network for mathematical knowledge in the human brain. Neuroimage 2019; 189:19-31. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.01.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 40] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/21/2017] [Revised: 12/12/2018] [Accepted: 01/02/2019] [Indexed: 01/29/2023] Open
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45
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Bugden S, Woldorff MG, Brannon EM. Shared and distinct neural circuitry for nonsymbolic and symbolic double-digit addition. Hum Brain Mapp 2018; 40:1328-1343. [PMID: 30548735 DOI: 10.1002/hbm.24452] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/09/2018] [Revised: 10/03/2018] [Accepted: 10/19/2018] [Indexed: 12/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Symbolic arithmetic is a complex, uniquely human ability that is acquired through direct instruction. In contrast, the capacity to mentally add and subtract nonsymbolic quantities such as dot arrays emerges without instruction and can be seen in human infants and nonhuman animals. One possibility is that the mental manipulation of nonsymbolic arrays provides a critical scaffold for developing symbolic arithmetic abilities. To explore this hypothesis, we examined whether there is a shared neural basis for nonsymbolic and symbolic double-digit addition. In parallel, we asked whether there are brain regions that are associated with nonsymbolic and symbolic addition independently. First, relative to visually matched control tasks, we found that both nonsymbolic and symbolic addition elicited greater neural signal in the bilateral intraparietal sulcus (IPS), bilateral inferior temporal gyrus, and the right superior parietal lobule. Subsequent representational similarity analyses revealed that the neural similarity between nonsymbolic and symbolic addition was stronger relative to the similarity between each addition condition and its visually matched control task, but only in the bilateral IPS. These findings suggest that the IPS is involved in arithmetic calculation independent of stimulus format.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stephanie Bugden
- Psychology Department, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
| | - Marty G Woldorff
- Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina
| | - Elizabeth M Brannon
- Psychology Department, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
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46
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Nemmi F, Schel MA, Klingberg T. Connectivity of the Human Number Form Area Reveals Development of a Cortical Network for Mathematics. Front Hum Neurosci 2018; 12:465. [PMID: 30534064 PMCID: PMC6275176 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2018.00465] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/26/2018] [Accepted: 11/05/2018] [Indexed: 02/05/2023] Open
Abstract
The adult brain contains cortical areas thought to be specialized for the analysis of numbers (the putative number form area, NFA) and letters (the visual word form area, VWFA). Although functional development of the VWFA has been investigated, it is largely unknown when and how the NFA becomes specialized and connected to the rest of the brain. One hypothesis is that NFA and VWFA derive their special functions through differential connectivity, but the development of this differential connectivity has not been shown. Here, we mapped the resting state connectivity of NFA and VWFA to the rest of the brain in a large sample (n = 437) of individuals (age 3.2-21 years). We show that within NFA-math network and within VWFA-reading network the strength of connectivity increases with age. The right NFA is significantly connected to the right intraparietal cortex already at the earliest age tested (age 3), before formal mathematical education has begun. This connection might support or enable an early understanding of magnitude or numerosity In contrast, the functional connectivity from NFA to the left anterior intraparietal cortex and to the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is not different from the functional connectivity of VWFA to these regions until around 12-14 years of age. The increase in connectivity to these regions was associated with a gradual increase in mathematical ability in an independent sample. In contrast, VWFA connects significantly to Broca's region around age 6, and this connectivity is correlated with reading ability. These results show how the differential connectivity of the networks for mathematics and reading slowly emerges through years of training and education.
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Affiliation(s)
- Federico Nemmi
- Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden
- INSERM U1214 Centre d’Imagerie Neuro Toulouse, Toulouse, France
| | - Margot A. Schel
- Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden
- Institute of Psychology, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands
| | - Torkel Klingberg
- Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden
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47
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Pollack C, Price GR. Neurocognitive mechanisms of digit processing and their relationship with mathematics competence. Neuroimage 2018; 185:245-254. [PMID: 30342974 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2018.10.047] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/26/2018] [Revised: 10/15/2018] [Accepted: 10/17/2018] [Indexed: 01/30/2023] Open
Abstract
The dominant model of number processing suggests the existence of a Number Form Area (NFA) in the inferior temporal gyrus (ITG) that supports the processing of Arabic digits as visual symbols of number. However, studies have produced inconsistent evidence for the presence and laterality of digit-specific ITG activity. Furthermore, whether any such activity relates to mathematical competence is unknown. This study investigated these two issues using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Thirty-two adults performed digit and letter detection tasks and reading and mathematics tests. During digit detection, participants determined whether digits were present in a string of letters (e.g., AH3NR versus AHTNR). During letter detection, participants determined whether letters were present in a string of digits (e.g., 93R78 versus 93478). Results showed four clusters in frontal, occipital, and temporal regions for digit detection, including a left ITG cluster. Five clusters in frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal regions were associated with letter detection, including a left ITG cluster. Digit and letter-related ITG clusters were spatially distinct; however, a direct contrast of digit and letter processing did not reveal greater activity in the left ITG for digit detection. Whole brain correlations showed greater digit-related activity in the right ITG for participants with higher calculation skills, but there was no correlation between letter activity and calculation skills. Together, our results suggest functional localization, but not specialization, for digits in the left ITG and provide the first evidence of a relationship between calculation skills and digit processing in the right ITG.
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Affiliation(s)
- Courtney Pollack
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Vanderbilt University, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, TN 37203, USA
| | - Gavin R Price
- Department of Psychology & Human Development, Vanderbilt University, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, TN 37203, USA.
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48
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Pinheiro-Chagas P, Daitch A, Parvizi J, Dehaene S. Brain Mechanisms of Arithmetic: A Crucial Role for Ventral Temporal Cortex. J Cogn Neurosci 2018; 30:1757-1772. [PMID: 30063177 DOI: 10.1162/jocn_a_01319] [Citation(s) in RCA: 28] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/04/2022]
Abstract
Elementary arithmetic requires a complex interplay between several brain regions. The classical view, arising from fMRI, is that the intraparietal sulcus (IPS) and the superior parietal lobe (SPL) are the main hubs for arithmetic calculations. However, recent studies using intracranial electroencephalography have discovered a specific site, within the posterior inferior temporal cortex (pITG), that activates during visual perception of numerals, with widespread adjacent responses when numerals are used in calculation. Here, we reexamined the contribution of the IPS, SPL, and pITG to arithmetic by recording intracranial electroencephalography signals while participants solved addition problems. Behavioral results showed a classical problem size effect: RTs increased with the size of the operands. We then examined how high-frequency broadband (HFB) activity is modulated by problem size. As expected from previous fMRI findings, we showed that the total HFB activity in IPS and SPL sites increased with problem size. More surprisingly, pITG sites showed an initial burst of HFB activity that decreased as the operands got larger, yet with a constant integral over the whole trial, thus making these signals invisible to slow fMRI. Although parietal sites appear to have a more sustained function in arithmetic computations, the pITG may have a role of early identification of the problem difficulty, beyond merely digit recognition. Our results ask for a reevaluation of the current models of numerical cognition and reveal that the ventral temporal cortex contains regions specifically engaged in mathematical processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Pedro Pinheiro-Chagas
- CEA DRF/12BM, INSERM, Université Paris-Sud, Université Paris-Saclay.,Stanford University
| | | | | | - Stanislas Dehaene
- CEA DRF/12BM, INSERM, Université Paris-Sud, Université Paris-Saclay.,Collège de France, Paris
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49
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Amalric M, Dehaene S. Cortical circuits for mathematical knowledge: evidence for a major subdivision within the brain's semantic networks. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2018; 373:rstb.2016.0515. [PMID: 29292362 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2016.0515] [Citation(s) in RCA: 43] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 06/17/2017] [Indexed: 01/29/2023] Open
Abstract
Is mathematical language similar to natural language? Are language areas used by mathematicians when they do mathematics? And does the brain comprise a generic semantic system that stores mathematical knowledge alongside knowledge of history, geography or famous people? Here, we refute those views by reviewing three functional MRI studies of the representation and manipulation of high-level mathematical knowledge in professional mathematicians. The results reveal that brain activity during professional mathematical reflection spares perisylvian language-related brain regions as well as temporal lobe areas classically involved in general semantic knowledge. Instead, mathematical reflection recycles bilateral intraparietal and ventral temporal regions involved in elementary number sense. Even simple fact retrieval, such as remembering that 'the sine function is periodical' or that 'London buses are red', activates dissociated areas for math versus non-math knowledge. Together with other fMRI and recent intracranial studies, our results indicated a major separation between two brain networks for mathematical and non-mathematical semantics, which goes a long way to explain a variety of facts in neuroimaging, neuropsychology and developmental disorders.This article is part of a discussion meeting issue 'The origins of numerical abilities'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marie Amalric
- Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, CEA DSV/I2BM, INSERM, Université Paris-Sud, Université Paris-Saclay, NeuroSpin center, 91191 Gif/Yvette, France .,Collège de France, Paris, France.,Sorbonne Universités, UPMC Univ Paris 06, IFD, 4 place Jussieu, Paris, France
| | - Stanislas Dehaene
- Cognitive Neuroimaging Unit, CEA DSV/I2BM, INSERM, Université Paris-Sud, Université Paris-Saclay, NeuroSpin center, 91191 Gif/Yvette, France .,Collège de France, Paris, France
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50
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Skagenholt M, Träff U, Västfjäll D, Skagerlund K. Examining the Triple Code Model in numerical cognition: An fMRI study. PLoS One 2018; 13:e0199247. [PMID: 29953456 PMCID: PMC6023115 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0199247] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/28/2017] [Accepted: 06/04/2018] [Indexed: 01/11/2023] Open
Abstract
The Triple Code Model (TCM) of numerical cognition argues for the existence of three representational codes for number: Arabic digits, verbal number words, and analog nonsymbolic magnitude representations, each subserved by functionally dissociated neural substrates. Despite the popularity of the TCM, no study to date has explored all three numerical codes within one fMRI paradigm. We administered three tasks, associated with each of the aforementioned numerical codes, in order to explore the neural correlates of numerosity processing in a sample of adults (N = 46). Independent task-control contrast analyses revealed task-dependent activity in partial support of the model, but also highlight the inherent complexity of a distributed and overlapping fronto-parietal network involved in all numerical codes. The results indicate that the TCM correctly predicts the existence of some functionally dissociated neural substrates, but requires an update that accounts for interactions with attentional processes. Parametric contrasts corresponding to differences in task difficulty revealed specific neural correlates of the distance effect, where closely spaced numbers become more difficult to discriminate than numbers spaced further apart. A conjunction analysis illustrated overlapping neural correlates across all tasks, in line with recent proposals for a fronto-parietal network of number processing. We additionally provide tentative results suggesting the involvement of format-independent numerosity-sensitive retinotopic maps in the early visual stream, extending previous findings of nonsymbolic stimulus selectivity. We discuss the functional roles of the components associated with the model, as well as the purported fronto-parietal network, and offer arguments in favor of revising the TCM.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mikael Skagenholt
- Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- Department of Management and Engineering, Division of Economics, JEDI-Lab, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
| | - Ulf Träff
- Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
| | - Daniel Västfjäll
- Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- Department of Management and Engineering, Division of Economics, JEDI-Lab, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- Decision Research, Eugene, OR, United States of America
- Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, United States of America
- Center for Social and Affective Neuroscience (CSAN), Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
| | - Kenny Skagerlund
- Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- Department of Management and Engineering, Division of Economics, JEDI-Lab, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- Center for Social and Affective Neuroscience (CSAN), Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
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