Domain-general and language-specific brain networks are differentially associated with verbal intelligence during
Zihang Zhou1, Xiaohong Yang1,2,3, Ping Ju1
1Department of Psychology, Renmin University of China, No. 59, Zhongguancun Street, Beijing 100872, China.
None:
Understanding how verbal intelligence develops requires clarifying the roles of domain-general and language-selective brain systems. Here, we examined this question in an accelerated longitudinal cohort of children and adolescents from Beijing (N = 170) by relating gray matter volume measures to the verbal comprehension index (VCI) of the Wechsler intelligence scale, a widely used measure of verbal intelligence. We observed that individual differences in VCI were more strongly associated with structural maturation of domain-general networks, including the default mode (DM) and multiple-demand (MD) systems, than with the language-selective network, and that these effects varied with age. Independent validation in a Chongqing cohort (N = 150) confirmed significant contributions of domain-general networks during adolescence (13-15 years). These findings highlight a previously underappreciated role of domain-general cortical systems in the development of verbal intelligence during adolescence and provide new insight into the neural basis of abstract verbal reasoning across development.
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