The Brain On Math.

I was off following a lead on Math and the brain and stumbled across an article I found quite interesting.  According to the article, neuroscientists have wondered which part of the brain is used for complex mathematical thinking.  Traditional thinking said that solving mathematical problems requires a complex manipulation of symbols and relationships, consequently, it must use the same part of the brain as language is processed.

Not everyone agreed with this view including Albert Einstein.  So two researchers designed a study to test this out.  The study involved 15 high level mathematicians and 15 high level academics in other fields.  All were asked to listen to  short sentences made up of both mathematical and non-mathematical statements under a working MRI.

The subjects listened to 90 questions, 72 were high level math statements divided into topology and three other areas while 18 were mostly historical in nature.  They had four seconds to decide if the material was true, false, or meaningless

 The results showed certain parts of the brain lit us as the mathematicians thought about the math.  This includes the same area identified in babies for basic number sense.  The MRI showed three parts of the brain lit up when the high level mathematicians worked on the mathematical problems.  These three areas did not light up for the other academic people until they were asked more general mathematical questions. Furthermore, they did not light up when the mathematicians read non-math problems.

What this shows is that the parietal, the prefrontal and inferior temporal areas process math regardless of the complexity of the problems.  This means that when a high level mathematician is balancing his checkbook he is using the same part of his brain he uses as when he is trying to find proof of Riemann Hypothesis.

In addition, none of the areas that light up are associated with language processing indicating that a different part of the brain is used to process math regardless of the type of math.   Furthermore even though language is associated with learning math, math still uses its own part of the brain.

At this point they do not know how innate number sense and higher level processing occurs. They also don't know if studying enough math to become an expert changes the way you do arithmetic or if learning arithmetic lays the foundation that allows you to learn higher level mathematical concepts.

This opens up a new avenue of research. One where they hope to explore to try teaching someone enough math while monitoring the brain to see what happens.  Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day.