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Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study

There has been a long tradition of research on mathematics education showing that children and adults use different strategies to solve arithmetic problems. Neurophysiological studies have recently begun to investigate the brain correlates of these strategies. The existing body of data, however, ref...

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Autores principales: Grabner, Roland H., De Smedt, Bert
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2012
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3498901/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23162495
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00428
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author Grabner, Roland H.
De Smedt, Bert
author_facet Grabner, Roland H.
De Smedt, Bert
author_sort Grabner, Roland H.
collection PubMed
description There has been a long tradition of research on mathematics education showing that children and adults use different strategies to solve arithmetic problems. Neurophysiological studies have recently begun to investigate the brain correlates of these strategies. The existing body of data, however, reflect static end points of the learning process and do not provide information on how brain activity changes in response to training or intervention. In this study, we explicitly address this issue by training participants in using fact retrieval strategies. We also investigate whether brain activity related to arithmetic fact learning is domain-specific or whether this generalizes to other learning materials, such as the solution of figural-spatial problems. Twenty adult students were trained on sets of two-digit multiplication problems and figural-spatial problems. After the training, they were presented with the trained and untrained problems while their brain activity was recorded by means of electroencephalography (EEG). In both problem types, the training resulted in accuracies over 90% and significant decreases in solution times. Analyses of the oscillatory EEG data also revealed training effects across both problem types. Specifically, we observed training-related activity increases in the theta band (3–6 Hz) and decreases in the lower alpha band (8–10 Hz), especially over parietooccipital and parietal brain regions. These results provide the first evidence that a short-term fact retrieval training results in significant changes in oscillatory EEG activity. These findings further corroborate the role of the theta band in the retrieval of semantic information from memory and suggest that theta activity is sensitive to fact retrieval not only in mental arithmetic but also in other domains.
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spelling pubmed-34989012012-11-16 Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study Grabner, Roland H. De Smedt, Bert Front Psychol Psychology There has been a long tradition of research on mathematics education showing that children and adults use different strategies to solve arithmetic problems. Neurophysiological studies have recently begun to investigate the brain correlates of these strategies. The existing body of data, however, reflect static end points of the learning process and do not provide information on how brain activity changes in response to training or intervention. In this study, we explicitly address this issue by training participants in using fact retrieval strategies. We also investigate whether brain activity related to arithmetic fact learning is domain-specific or whether this generalizes to other learning materials, such as the solution of figural-spatial problems. Twenty adult students were trained on sets of two-digit multiplication problems and figural-spatial problems. After the training, they were presented with the trained and untrained problems while their brain activity was recorded by means of electroencephalography (EEG). In both problem types, the training resulted in accuracies over 90% and significant decreases in solution times. Analyses of the oscillatory EEG data also revealed training effects across both problem types. Specifically, we observed training-related activity increases in the theta band (3–6 Hz) and decreases in the lower alpha band (8–10 Hz), especially over parietooccipital and parietal brain regions. These results provide the first evidence that a short-term fact retrieval training results in significant changes in oscillatory EEG activity. These findings further corroborate the role of the theta band in the retrieval of semantic information from memory and suggest that theta activity is sensitive to fact retrieval not only in mental arithmetic but also in other domains. Frontiers Media S.A. 2012-10-19 /pmc/articles/PMC3498901/ /pubmed/23162495 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00428 Text en Copyright © 2012 Grabner and De Smedt. http://www.frontiersin.org/licenseagreement This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in other forums, provided the original authors and source are credited and subject to any copyright notices concerning any third-party graphics etc.
spellingShingle Psychology
Grabner, Roland H.
De Smedt, Bert
Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study
title Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study
title_full Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study
title_fullStr Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study
title_full_unstemmed Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study
title_short Oscillatory EEG Correlates of Arithmetic Strategies: A Training Study
title_sort oscillatory eeg correlates of arithmetic strategies: a training study
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3498901/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23162495
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00428
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