Current project

How do humans learn and manipulate mathematical concepts? In previous research, I have shown that (1) advanced mathematical reflection on concepts encoded for many years recruits envolutionarily ancient brain circuits for numerosity and space, but dispenses with language; (2) the non-verbal acquisition of geometrical rules call upon a language of thought that is independent of natural spoken language. The question remains however to understand how the human brain acquire math knowledge in schools, where knowledge is taught verbally. In my current project, I am developping original methods to collect and analyse naturalistic data, in a first attempt to introduce real-world learning conditions in fMRI laboratory settings, with the ultimate goal to investigate the evolution of adults' and children's brain activity during verbal and explicit math learning. With the support of a H2020 Marie Sklodowska-Curie Global Fellowship, I am currently leading two studies with naturalistic tasks: one in adults, destined to evaluate the impact of watching short videos on math acquisition; and another probing the validity of this empirical approach with children.