Paper Info
Title
Anatomically ordered tapping interferes more with one-digit addition than two-digit addition: a dual-task fMRI study
Abstract
Fingers are used as canonical representations for numbers across cultures. In previous imaging studies, it was shown that arithmetic processing activates neural resources that are known to participate in finger movements. Additionally, in one dual-task study, it was shown that anatomically ordered finger tapping disrupts addition and subtraction more than multiplication, possibly due to a long-lasting effect of early finger counting experiences on the neural correlates and organization of addition and subtraction processes. How arithmetic task difficulty and tapping complexity affect the concurrent performance is still unclear. If early finger counting experiences have bearing on the neural correlates of arithmetic in adults, then one would expect anatomically and non-anatomically ordered tapping to have different interference effects, given that finger counting is usually anatomically ordered. To unravel these issues, we studied how (1) arithmetic task difficulty and (2) the complexity of the finger tapping sequence (anatomical vs. non-anatomical ordering) affect concurrent performance and use of key neural circuits using a mixed block/event-related dual-task fMRI design with adult participants. The results suggest that complexity of the tapping sequence modulates interference on addition, and that one-digit addition (fact retrieval), compared to two-digit addition (calculation), is more affected from anatomically ordered tapping. The region-of-interest analysis showed higher left angular gyrus BOLD response for one-digit compared to two-digit addition, and in no-tapping conditions than dual tapping conditions. The results support a specific association between addition fact retrieval and anatomically ordered finger movements in adults, possibly due to finger counting strategies that deploy anatomically ordered finger movements early in the development.
Year
DOI
Venue
2016
10.1007/s10339-015-0737-2
Cognitive processing
Keywords
Field
DocType
Angular gyrus,Arithmetic,Embodied cognition,Finger tapping,Numerical cognition,fMRI
Neural correlates of consciousness,Neuroscience,Finger-counting,Computer science,Numerical digit,Angular gyrus,Tapping,Numerical cognition,Biological neural network,Subtraction
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
17
1
1612-4790
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
0
0.34
7
Authors
2
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
firat soylu132.51
Sharlene D Newman2308.36