Federico, Giovanni, Reynaud, Emanuelle, Navarro, Jordan, Lesourd, Mathieu, Gaujoux, Vivien, Lamberton, Franck, Ibarrola, Danièle, Cavaliere, Carlo, Alfano, Vincenzo, Aiello, Marco, Salvatore, Marco, Seguin, Perrine, Schnebelen, Damien, Brandimonte, Maria, Rossetti, Yves, Osiurak, François, Osiurak, François, SDN - Istituto di Ricerca Diagnostica e Nucleare, Laboratoire d'Etude des Mécanismes Cognitifs (EMC), Université Lumière - Lyon 2 (UL2), Laboratoire de Neurosciences Intégratives et Cliniques - UFC (UR 481) (NEURO), Université de Franche-Comté (UFC), Université Bourgogne Franche-Comté [COMUE] (UBFC)-Université Bourgogne Franche-Comté [COMUE] (UBFC), Maison des Sciences de l'Homme et de l'Environnement Claude Nicolas Ledoux (UAR 3124) (MSHE), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université de Franche-Comté (UFC), Centre d'Etude et de Recherche Multimodal Et Pluridisciplinaire en imagerie du vivant (CERMEP - imagerie du vivant), Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (UCBL), Université de Lyon-Université de Lyon-CHU Grenoble-Hospices Civils de Lyon (HCL)-CHU Saint-Etienne-Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne (UJM)-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Grenoble Alpes (UGA), Santé Lyon Est - Louis Léopold Ollier, Université de Lyon-Université de Lyon-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Centre de recherche en neurosciences de Lyon - Lyon Neuroscience Research Center (CRNL), Université de Lyon-Université de Lyon-Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne (UJM)-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Università degli studi Suor Orsola Benincasa (UNISOB), Hospices Civils de Lyon (HCL), Hôpital Henry Gabrielle [CHU - HCL], Institut Universitaire de France (IUF), and Ministère de l'Education nationale, de l’Enseignement supérieur et de la Recherche (M.E.N.E.S.R.)
International audience; Most recent research highlights how a specific form of causal understanding, namely technical reasoning, may support the increasing complexity of tools and techniques developed by humans over generations, i.e., the cumulative technological culture (CTC). Thus, investigating the neurocognitive foundations of technical reasoning is essential to comprehend the emergence of CTC in our lineage. Whereas functional neuroimaging evidence started to highlight the critical role of the area PF of the left inferior parietal cortex (IPC) in technical reasoning, no studies explored the links between the structural characteristics of such a brain region and technical reasoning skills. Therefore, in this study, we assessed participants’ technical-reasoning performance by using two ad-hoc psycho-technical tests; then, we extracted from participants’ 3 T T1-weighted magnetic-resonance brain images the cortical thickness (i.e., a volume-related measure which is associated with cognitive performance as reflecting the size, density, and arrangement of cells in a brain region) of all the IPC regions for both hemispheres. We found that the cortical thickness of the left area PF predicts participants’ technical-reasoning performance. Crucially, we reported no correlations between technical reasoning and the other IPC regions, possibly suggesting the specificity of the left area PF in generating technical knowledge. We discuss these findings from an evolutionary perspective, by speculating about how the evolution of parietal lobes may have supported the emergence of technical reasoning in our lineage.