Topographic Representation of Numerosity in the Human Parietal Cortex

• Published in: Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Vol. 341; no. 6150; pp. 1123 - 1126
• Main Authors: Harvey, B. M., Klein, B. P., Petridou, N., Dumoulin, S. O.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Association for the Advancement of Science 06.09.2013; The American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Subjects: Adult; Biological and medical sciences; Brain; Brain Mapping; cortex; Cortexes; Displays; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Human; Humans; Magnetic resonance imaging; Male; Mathematical Concepts; Mathematical functions; Mental stimulation; Motor ability; Neurons; Neurophysiology; Parietal Lobe - anatomy & histology; Parietal Lobe - physiology; Perception; Photic Stimulation; Representations; Scanning; Scientific Concepts; Sensory perception; Statistical variance; Topographic mapping; Topography; Tuning; Vertebrates: nervous system and sense organs; Young Adult; Human; Stimulus; Central nervous system; Parietal cortex; Nuclear magnetic resonance imaging; Encephalon; Functional imaging
• ISSN: 0036-8075; 1095-9203; 1095-9203
• DOI: 10.1126/science.1239052

Numerosity, the set size of a group of items, is processed by the association cortex, but certain aspects mirror the properties of primary senses. Sensory cortices contain topographic maps reflecting the structure of sensory organs. Are the cortical representation and processing of numerosity organized topographically, even though no sensory organ has a numerical structure? Using high-field functional magnetic resonance imaging (at a field strength of 7 teslas), we described neural populations tuned to small numerosities in the human parietal cortex. They are organized topographically, forming a numerosity map that is robust to changes in low-level stimulus features. The cortical surface area devoted to specific numerosities decreases with increasing numerosity, and the tuning width increases with preferred numerosity. These organizational properties extend topographic principles to the representation of higher-order abstract features in the association cortex.