The frontoparietal network activated during calculation processing is investigated in a pediatric population. Subjects assessed correctness of two and three operand equations. Besides traditional frontoparietal activation, clear activation of sites associated with error processing was observed

Danielle Bal&#xe9

Katrien Mondt

Philippe Paquier

Piet Van de Craen

Thierry Metens

Vincent Denolin

Nature Precedings

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Submitted on March 19th 2008 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Investigating the frontoparietal network in mental calculation in primary school 
children  - An fMRI study. 
 
Katrien Mondt1, Danielle Balériaux2, Thierry Metens2, Philippe Paquier1,3,4, Piet Van de 
Craen1, Vincent Denolin2 
 
1Department of Linguistics, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, 2MR Unit, Department of Medical 
Imaging, Université Libre de Bruxelles-Hôpital Erasme, 3Department of Neurology and 
Neuropsychology, Université Libre de Bruxelles-Hôpital Erasme, 4 Unit of Neurosciences, 
School of Medecine, Universiteit Antwerpen. 
 
 
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ABSTRACT. The frontoparietal network activated during calculation processing is 
investigated in a pediatric population. Subjects assessed correctness of two and three operand 
equations. Besides traditional frontoparietal activation, clear activation of sites associated 
with error processing was observed.  
 
In this study, 21 children (mean age 9.62; ST 1,07; 10 boys and 11 girls) performed a mental 
calculation paradigm, which consisted of assessing correctness of visually presented two-
operand (eg. 1+5=6) and three-operand (eg. 7-5=2+0) equations by a button press. The 
control task consisted of pressing a button when a string of five numbers contained a zero. 
Data acquisition involved BOLD sensitive T2 weighted functional magnetic resonance 
images acquired with a single-shot gradient-echo-EPI sequence on a 1,5 Tesla Gyroscan 
Intera (Philips Medical Systems, Best, The Netherlands) using a standard head coil. 
Repetition time: 3000ms; echotime 50 ms; 32 slices of 4,85 mm; 150 dynamic scans. Total 
scanning time was 459,00 s/paradigm; field of view 200 mm x 200 mm with acquisition 
matrix of 64 x 64 and reconstruction matrix of 128 x 128. Statistical Parametric Mapping2 
(Wellcome Department of Imaging Neuroscience, London, UK) (SPM2) was used as 
postprocessing software, implemented in MATLAB 6.5 R12 (Math Works, Natick, MA, 
USA). Spatial preprocessing included spatial realignment, coregistration of the functional and 
anatomical image, normalisation to standard space and spatial smoothing. Reslicing was 
postponed to the coregistration phase. Normalisation was done using the pediatric medium 
template version 2 from CCHMC (Cincinnati, Ohio, USA). This whole- brain T1 weighted 
image is used since pediatric brains differ in size and shape from adult ones and inference is 
more solid when normalising to an adapted pediatric template (Wilke et al, 2002). Here, the 
medium template is used based on material from 67 children aged 9 – 12. The coregistered 
anatomical file was used as source image to which the anatomical and functional normalised 
files were written. Finally the coregistered and normalized data was smoothed through a 
gaussian filter of 8 x 8 x 8 mm full width at half maximum to reduce anatomical discrepancies 
between subjects and improve signal to noise ratio. 
 
The calculation task is reproduced from Menon et al (2000, 2002) and Rivera et al (2005). 
The latter study investigated calculation processing in a developmental framework, using only 
the two-operand condition and a passive baseline task. Decreasing activation with age 
increasing (younger>older) included the bilateral superior and middle frontal gyrus, left 
inferior frontal gyrus, supplementary motor area, and anterior cingulate; bilateral basal 
ganglia; left medial temporal and fusiform gyrus; bilateral brainstem; and left insula and 
frontal operculum. Increased activation with increasing age included the left lateral occipito-
temporal area; and the left supramarignal and inferior parietal sulcus area (Rivera et al, 2005). 
Results from this study are presented in the table. 
 
 
TABLE 1 
 
Although no parietal activation can be observed in the simple equations (except with ROI 
analysis, cluster p corr 0.0239; cluster p uncorr 0.0118; peak coordinates –30, -70, 50; 
posterior inferior parietal area near superior parietal gyrus), it is present in the complex 
equations. This suggests that a frontal network mostly resolves the simple task, while 
“quantity” related processing associated with bilateral superior/inferior parietal regions 
(Dehaene, 2004; Chochon, 1999) can clearly be observed in the complex task. Within the 
frontal activation, however, no dorsolateral or ventrolateral prefrontal cortex activation could 
be retrieved unlike results found in Rivera’s (2005) study. This is probably due to the control 
task used in analysis. The active, high-level control task here eliminates DLPFC activation as 
well as substantial anterior cingulate activation, which could only be retrieved below 
significance level, since a substantial amount of attentional and working memory resources 
are necessary to perform the control task. The insular activation could also not be retrieved 
here, although the opercular part of the inferior frontal gyrus is consistently activated in both 
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analyses, and this activation extends towards BA 48.  The superior medial and SMA 
activation, as well as premotor activation can clearly be retrieved in the present results as in 
Rivera’s (2005) study.  
As such, the present results clearly corroborate the existing models on a frontoparietal 
network involved in mental calculation. The observation made by Rivera and colleagues 
(2005) regarding an increased recruitment of the parietal areas with increasing age also 
validate the small activations found in this area in a single group analysis of primary school 
children. Furthermore, the extensive fusiform/lingual activation found in the present data also 
corroborate findings from these studies. An Anova Test (simple<complex) revealed activation 
in the right fusiform gyrus  
However, medial temporal activation was not retrieved in this study. Rivera et al (2005; 1781) 
ascribe this activation to (1) sustaining appropriate memory representations and (2) 
generalized novelty effects.  Absence of this activation may be due to the use of a high-level 
control task or may reflect an actual deactivation in adults in Rivera’s (2005) study, in 
concordance with an increased parietal “quantity” activation. Thus suggesting a network less 
dependent on memory processes in adult performers.  
 
 
 
 
Acknowledgements. Research funded by the Brussels Capital Region in collaboration with 
the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Department of Linguistics, & the Université Libre de 
Bruxelles, Department of Medical Imaging.  
 
Competing financial interests statement. The authors state that there are no competing 
financial interests regarding this paper. 
 
 
References 
 
 
Chochon, F. et al. (1999) Differential contributions of the left and right inferior 
parietal lobules to number processing. J Cogn Neurosci, 11, 617-630. 
Dehaene, S. et al. (2004) Arithmetic and the Brain. Curr Opin Neurobiol 14, 218 – 224. 
Menon, V. et al. (2002) Prefrontal cortex involvement in processing incorrect 
arithmetic equations: evidence from event-related fMRI. Hum Brain Mapp, 16, 119-
130. 
Menon, V. et al. (2000) Dissociating prefrontal and parietal cortex activation during 
arithmetic processing. Neuroimage, 12, 357-365. 
Rivera, s. et al. (2005) Developmental changes in mental arithmetic: Evidence for 
increased functional specialisation in the left inferior parietal cortex. Cerebral Cortex, 
15, 1779-1790. 
Wilke, M. et al. (2002) Assessment of spatial normalization of whole-brain magnetic 
resonance images in children. Hum Brain Mapp 17, 48 - 60 
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Single group results (RFX, One-sampled-T-test) 
Cluster p   MNI 
coordinates 
   
Corr Uncorr Cluster 
size 
Voxel T 
value 
x y z Region H BA
Simple (-1 1 0) (n 21)     
0.000 0.000 2347 8.89 -10 -86 4 Medial calcarine 
extending into lingual 
gyrus 
L 17/18
0.019 0.002 323 5.55 22 -79 -14 Lingual/fusiform R 18
0.003 0.000 475 5.42 16 -80 14 Lingual gyrus  R 18
0.069 0.009 222 5.00 -48 -2 40 Premotor extending into 
opercular  IFG 
L 6/44
0.072 0.009 219 4.16 -22 -6 54 Frontal superior 
extending into SMA 
L 6/8
         
Complex (-1 0 1) (n 21)     
0.000 0.000 1668 7.42 -16 -84 -18 Lingual & fusiform 
gyrus 
L 18/19
0.341 0.047 105 5.23 -30 -64 54 Parietal superior 
extending into IPG 
L 7
0.287 0.038 116 4.93 14 -86 6 Lingual & fusiform 
gyrus 
R 18
0.209 0.026 136 4.45 -48 0 38 Premotor extending into 
opercular  IFG 
L 6/44
0.202 0.025 138 4.33 -6 14 60 SMA L 6
         
         
Table: RFX 1-sampled T test results for the two-operand (simple) equation and three-
operand (complex) equation (n 21). Height threshold p=0.001, k=10: p uncorrected cluster < 
0.05, MNI coordinates. Abbreviations: H= Hemisphere; BA= Brodmann area,corr= corrected 
for multiple comparisons; uncorr= uncorrected;  IFG= inferior frontal gyrus; SMA= 
supplementary motor area; IPG= inferior parietal gyrus  
 
 
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Investigating the frontoparietal network in mental calculation in primary school children - An fMRI study

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Investigating the frontoparietal network in mental calculation in primary school children - An fMRI study

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