Neural Mechanisms Underlying the Income-Achievement Gap: The Role of the Ventral Visual Stream

Authors

Maya L. Rosen, Harvard Faculty of Arts and SciencesFollow
Lucy A. Lurie, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Kelly A. Sambrook, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Andrew N. Meltzoff, University of Washington
Katie A. McLaughlin, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

12-1-2021

Publication Title

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience

Abstract

Children from low-socioeconomic status (SES) households on average exhibit lower academic achievement than their higher-SES peers. We investigated a novel hypothesis that differences in early-developing sensory networks—specifically the ventral visual stream (VVS), which is involved in processing visual stimuli—contribute to SES-related disparities in executive functions (EF) and academic outcomes. We used fMRI to investigate SES-related differences in neural function in children (6–8 years, n = 62) during two attentional tasks involving attention to visual information: cued attention and memory-guided attention. Recruitment of VVS during both tasks was associated with EF and academic achievement, and SES-related differences in VVS activation during cued attention were marginally explained by differences in cognitive stimulation. VVS activation during cued attention mediated SES-related differences in academic achievement. Finally, the link between VVS activation during both tasks and academic achievement was mediated by differences in EF. We extend previous work by highlighting that: (i) early-developing visual processing regions play a role in supporting complex attentional processes, (ii) childhood SES is associated with VVS function, which is explained in part by SES-related differences in cognitive stimulation and (iii) provide preliminary evidence that individual differences in VVS function may play a role in the emergence of the income-achievement gap.

Keywords

Academic achievement, Cognitive stimulation, Executive function, fMRI, Socioeconomic status (SES), Visual association cortex

Volume

52

DOI

10.1016/j.dcn.2021.101025

ISSN

18789293

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Comments

Peer reviewed accepted manuscript.

Recommended Citation

Rosen, Maya L.; Lurie, Lucy A.; Sambrook, Kelly A.; Meltzoff, Andrew N.; and McLaughlin, Katie A., "Neural Mechanisms Underlying the Income-Achievement Gap: The Role of the Ventral Visual Stream" (2021). Neuroscience: Faculty Publications, Smith College, Northampton, MA.
https://scholarworks.smith.edu/nsc_facpubs/143