Finger-Based Numerical Training Increases Sensorimotor Activation for Arithmetic in Children-An fNIRS Study.

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Developmental Psychology
• Cognitive Science

Background:

• Children often use fingers for early counting and calculation.
• Behavioral links between finger gnosis, counting, and math skills suggest shared neural underpinnings.
• Neural overlap between finger and number representations is hypothesized.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if finger-based training induces neural activation in sensorimotor and parietal cortices during mental arithmetic.
• To explore the neural basis of embodied numerical representations.

Main Methods:

• Children underwent finger-based training in their first school year.
• Neural activation during mental arithmetic was measured using fMRI.
• Trained children were compared to a control group.

Main Results:

• Trained children exhibited finger-related arithmetic effects.
• Activation was observed in the sensorimotor cortex, potentially linked to implicit finger movements.
• Differences in the intraparietal sulcus (IPS) activation between groups were inconclusive.

Conclusions:

• Finger-based training can induce sensorimotor cortex plasticity related to numerical processing.
• This supports an embodied cognition perspective on number representation.
• Early arithmetic training involving fingers may shape neural development.