Causal dynamics of memory circuits in mathematical development from childhood to adulthood

Abstract

Mathematical cognition engages a distributed brain network, but the causal dynamics of information flow within it, particularly how memory circuits interact with other brain regions across development, remain unknown. We examined causal dynamic interactions in typically developing children and adolescents/young adults (AYA) using fMRI during three tasks involving mental arithmetic and symbolic and non-symbolic number comparison. Using multivariate dynamic state-space identification modeling, we found that causal dynamic interactions differed between children and AYA across all three tasks, especially during arithmetic processing. The left medial temporal lobe (MTL) served as a causal signaling hub in AYA across all three tasks, but not in children. The left angular gyrus (AG) maintained consistent hub-like properties during arithmetic task across development. Compared to AYA, children exhibited heightened causal interactions in both the MTL and AG. Moreover, network hub properties of these regions correlated with individual’s mathematical achievement specifically during arithmetic processing. Together, we found that the MTL transitioned from heightened, context-dependent, interactions in childhood to a stable causal hub in adulthood, while the AG maintained as a hub during arithmetic processing across development. This dissociation between memory systems, coupled with their task-specific relationship to mathematical abilities, provides novel insights into how brain networks mature to support mathematical cognition.