{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,27]],"date-time":"2026-03-27T15:53:08Z","timestamp":1774626788059,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":47,"publisher":"MIT Press - Journals","issue":"7","content-domain":{"domain":["direct.mit.edu"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":[],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2015,7,1]]},"abstract":"<jats:title>Abstract<\/jats:title>\n               <jats:p>In numerical cognition, there is a well-known but contested hypothesis that proposes an abstract representation of numerical magnitude in human intraparietal sulcus (IPS). On the other hand, researchers of object cognition have suggested another hypothesis for brain activity in IPS during the processing of number, namely that this activity simply correlates with the number of visual objects or units that are perceived. We contrasted these two accounts by analyzing multivoxel activity patterns elicited by dot patterns and Arabic digits of different magnitudes while participants were explicitly processing the represented numerical magnitude. The activity pattern elicited by the digit \u201c8\u201d was more similar to the activity pattern elicited by one dot (with which the digit shares the number of visual units but not the magnitude) compared to the activity pattern elicited by eight dots, with which the digit shares the represented abstract numerical magnitude. A multivoxel pattern classifier trained to differentiate one dot from eight dots classified all Arabic digits in the one-dot pattern category, irrespective of the numerical magnitude symbolized by the digit. These results were consistently obtained for different digits in IPS, its subregions, and many other brain regions. As predicted from object cognition theories, the number of presented visual units forms the link between the parietal activation elicited by symbolic and nonsymbolic numbers. The current study is difficult to reconcile with the hypothesis that parietal activation elicited by numbers would reflect a format-independent representation of number.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1162\/jocn_a_00787","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2015,1,29]],"date-time":"2015-01-29T17:12:22Z","timestamp":1422551542000},"page":"1376-1387","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1162\/mitpressjournals.corrections.policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":66,"title":["Visual Number Beats Abstract Numerical Magnitude: Format-dependent Representation of Arabic Digits and Dot Patterns in Human Parietal Cortex"],"prefix":"10.1162","volume":"27","author":[{"given":"Jessica","family":"Bulth\u00e9","sequence":"first","affiliation":[]},{"given":"Bert","family":"De Smedt","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[]},{"given":"Hans P.","family":"Op de Beeck","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[]}],"member":"281","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2015,7,1]]},"reference":[{"key":"2021073001021693800_R1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"165","DOI":"10.1016\/j.neuron.2007.01.001","article-title":"Does the parietal cortex distinguish between \u201c10,\u201d \u201cten,\u201d and ten dots?","volume":"53","author":"Ansari","year":"2007","journal-title":"Neuron"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"278","DOI":"10.1038\/nrn2334","article-title":"Effects of development and enculturation on number representation in the brain","volume":"9","author":"Ansari","year":"2008","journal-title":"Nature Reviews Neuroscience"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"799","DOI":"10.1016\/j.neuroimage.2006.04.184","article-title":"Dissociating response conflict from numerical magnitude processing in the brain: An event-related fMRI study","volume":"32","author":"Ansari","year":"2006","journal-title":"Neuroimage"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1845","DOI":"10.1162\/jocn.2007.19.11.1845","article-title":"Linking visual attention and number processing in the brain: The role of the temporo-parietal junction in small and large symbolic and nonsymbolic number comparison","volume":"19","author":"Ansari","year":"2007","journal-title":"Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"433","DOI":"10.1163\/156856897X00357","article-title":"The Psychophysics Toolbox","volume":"10","author":"Brainard","year":"1997","journal-title":"Spatial Vision"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R6","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"311","DOI":"10.1016\/j.neuroimage.2013.10.049","article-title":"Format-dependent representations of symbolic and non-symbolic numbers in the human cortex as revealed by multi-voxel pattern analyses","volume":"87","author":"Bulth\u00e9","year":"2014","journal-title":"Neuroimage"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1","DOI":"10.1109\/PRNI.2014.6858513","article-title":"A validation of a multi-spatial scale method for multivariate pattern analysis","volume-title":"2014 International Workshop on Pattern Recognition in Neuroimaging","author":"Bulth\u00e9","year":"2014"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"307","DOI":"10.1016\/j.neuron.2006.12.025","article-title":"Notation-dependent and -independent representations of numbers in the parietal lobes","volume":"53","author":"Cohen Kadosh","year":"2007","journal-title":"Neuron"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"313","DOI":"10.1017\/S0140525X09990938","article-title":"Numerical representation in the parietal lobes: Abstract or not abstract?","volume":"32","author":"Cohen Kadosh","year":"2009","journal-title":"The Behavioral and Brain Sciences"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2624","DOI":"10.1002\/hbm.22087","article-title":"Decoding the representation of numerical values from brain activation patterns","volume":"34","author":"Damarla","year":"2012","journal-title":"Human Brain Mapping"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"333","DOI":"10.1017\/S0140525X09990033","article-title":"The case for a notation-independent representation of number","volume":"32","author":"Dehaene","year":"2009","journal-title":"Behavioral and Brain Sciences"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"219","DOI":"10.1016\/S0010-9452(08)70002-9","article-title":"Cerebral pathways for calculation: Double dissociation between rote verbal","volume":"33","author":"Dehaene","year":"1997","journal-title":"Cortex"},{"key":"2021073001021693800_R13","unstructured":"Dehaene, S., Izard, V., & Piazza, M. 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