The neural representation of extensively trained ordered sequences

The role of the intraparietal sulcus (IPS) in number processing is largely agreed on. A current debate however concerns the specificity of the involvement of the IPS in representing numbers or ordinal sequences more generally. To test this specificity, we investigated whether the IPS would be activated by extensive training on an arbitrary ordered sequence. We found that the hippocampal-angular gyrus activation initially involved in learning the ordered sequences extends with extensive training to the left inferior frontal gyrus (left IFG), but not to the IPS. These results suggest that left IFG can be involved in processing ordinal information, and that there is no need for an IPS area specifically dedicated to the representation of all ordinal sequences. Instead, we propose that the locus of the representation might be determined by the nature of the stimuli rather than its ordinal nature per se.