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rTMS over the intraparietal sulcus disrupts numerosity processing

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Abstract

It has been widely argued that the intraparietal sulcus (IPS) is involved in tasks that evoke representations of numerical magnitude, among other cognitive functions. However, the causal role of this parietal region in processing symbolic and non-symbolic numerosity has not been established. The current study used repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) to the left and right IPS to investigate the effects of temporary deactivations of these regions on the capacity to represent symbolic (Arabic numbers) and non-symbolic (arrays of dots) numerosities. We found that comparisons of both symbolic and non-symbolic numerosities were impaired after rTMS to the left IPS but enhanced by rTMS to the right IPS. A signature effect of numerical distance was also found: greater impairment (or lesser facilitation) when comparing numerosities of similar magnitude. The reverse pattern of impairment and enhancement was found in a control task that required judging an analogue stimulus property (ellipse orientation) but no numerosity judgements. No rTMS effects for the numerosity tasks were found when stimulating an area adjacent but distinct from the IPS, the left and right angular gyrus. These data suggest that left IPS is critical for processing symbolic and non-symbolic numerosity; this processing may thus depend on common neural mechanisms, which are distinct from mechanisms supporting the processing of analogue stimulus properties.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by British Academy and Wellcome Trust Grants to MC, by a National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship to HB, by grants from the National Institutes of Health (K24 RR018875, RO1-EY12091, RO1-DC05672, RO1-NS 47,754, RO1-NS 20,068, and R01-EB 00,5047) to APL and by the Harvard Medical School Scholars in Clinical Science Program (NIH K30 HL04095-03) to FF. We would like to thank M. Finkbeiner for technical support, A. Caramazza, E. Freeman, and V. Walsh for useful comments, and the Harvard-Thorndike General Clinical Research Center for help in implementing the study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Non-Invasive Brain Stimulation, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02215, USA

    Marinella Cappelletti, Felipe Fregni & Alvaro Pascual-Leone

  2. Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London, London, WC1N 3AR, UK

    Marinella Cappelletti

  3. Department of Psychology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 02138, USA

    Hilary Barth & Elizabeth S. Spelke

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  1. Marinella Cappelletti
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  2. Hilary Barth
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  3. Felipe Fregni
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  5. Alvaro Pascual-Leone
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Correspondence to Marinella Cappelletti.

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H. Barth and F. Fregni contributed equally to this study.

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Cappelletti, M., Barth, H., Fregni, F. et al. rTMS over the intraparietal sulcus disrupts numerosity processing. Exp Brain Res 179, 631–642 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-006-0820-0

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