Dehaene Lab

Research focus

ERC Advanced Grant · 2022

Brain mechanisms underlying mathematics and its acquisition

Mathematics is a fundamental tool by which we understand the universe, yet its cognitive and brain mechanisms are vastly understudied. I propose a systematic study of the human representation of mathematical concepts and their growth with education. The project will test the “language of thought” theory according to which humans share core concepts with other animals (numbers, objects, shapes, spatial maps) but the growth of math relies on a human symbolic composition system that recursively recombines those concepts into arbitrarily more complex expressions. Work package (WP) 1 will generate maps of mathematical concepts in adults varying in education, using high-resolution single-subject…

From the public funding record at EU CORDIS. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.