No abstract

Disparities in home numeracy environments contribute to variations in children’s mathematical skills. However, the neural mechanisms underlying the relation between home numeracy experiences and mathematical learning are unknown. Here, parents of 66 eight-year-olds completed a questionnaire assessing the frequency of home numeracy practices. Neural adaptation to the repetition of Arabic numerals and words was measured in children using functional MRI ( n = 50) to assess how sensitive the brain is to the presentation of numerical and nonnumerical information. Disparities in home numeracy practices were related to differences in digit (but not word) processing in a region of the left intraparietal sulcus (IPS) that was also related to children’s arithmetic fluency. Furthermore, digit-related processing in the IPS influenced the relation between home numeracy practices and arithmetic fluency. Results were consistent with a model hypothesizing that home numeracy practices may affect children’s mathematical skills by modulating the IPS response to symbolic numerical information.

Previous studies indicate that children are exposed to different literacy experiences at home. Although these disparities have been shown to affect children’s literacy skills, it remains unclear whether and how home literacy practices influence brain activity underlying word-level reading. In the present study, we asked parents of French children from various socioeconomic backgrounds (n = 66; 8.46 ± 0.36 years, range 7.52–9.22; 20 girls) to report the frequency of home literacy practices. Neural adaptation to the repetition of printed words was then measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in a subset of these children (n = 44; 8.49 ± 0.33 years, range 8.02–9.14; 13 girls), thereby assessing how sensitive was the brain to the repeated presentation of these words. We found that more frequent home literacy practices were associated with enhanced word adaptation in the left posterior inferior frontal sulcus (r = 0.32). We also found that the frequency of home literacy practices was associated with children’s vocabulary skill (r = 0.25), which itself influenced the relation between home literacy practices and neural adaptation to words. Finally, none of these effects were observed in a digit adaptation task, highlighting their specificity to word recognition. These findings are consistent with a model positing that home literacy experiences may improve children’s vocabulary skill, which in turn may influence the neural mechanisms supporting word-level reading.