Behavioral and brain imaging studies speak to commonalities between reading and math. Here, we investigated relationships between individual differences in reading and math ability (single word reading and calculation) with brain anatomy (cortical thickness and surface area) in 342 participants between 6–22 years of age from the NIH Pediatric MRI Database. We found no brain-behavioral correlations in the full sample. When dividing the dataset into three age-specific subgroups, cortical thickness of the left supramarginal gyrus (SMG) and fusiform gyrus (FG) correlated with reading ability in the oldest subgroup (15–22 years) only. Next, we tested unique contributions of these educational measures to neuroanatomy. Single word reading ability, age, and their interaction all contributed unique variance to cortical thickness in the left SMG and intraparietal sulcus (IPS). Age, and the interaction between age and reading, predicted cortical thickness in the left FG. However, regression analyses for math ability showed no relationships with cortical thickness; nor for math or reading ability with surface area. Overall, our results demonstrate relationships between cortical thickness and reading ability in emerging adults, but not in younger age groups. Surprisingly, there were no such relationships with math, and hence no convergence between the reading and math results.

行为和大脑成像研究说明了阅读和数学之间的共性。在这里，我们调查了来自 NIH 儿科 MRI 数据库的 342 名 6-22 岁参与者的阅读和数学能力（单字阅读和计算）个体差异与大脑解剖结构（皮质厚度和表面积）之间的关系。我们在整个样本中没有发现大脑行为相关性。将数据集分为三个特定年龄的亚组时，左侧边缘上回 (SMG) 和梭状回 (FG) 的皮质厚度仅与最老亚组（15-22 岁）的阅读能力相关。接下来，我们测试了这些教育措施对神经解剖学的独特贡献。单字阅读能力、年龄及其相互作用都对左侧 SMG 和顶内沟 (IPS) 的皮质厚度产生了独特的差异。年龄以及年龄和阅读之间的相互作用可以预测左侧 FG 的皮质厚度。然而，数学能力的回归分析显示与皮质厚度没有关系；也不是数学或阅读表面积的能力。总体而言，我们的结果证明了新兴成年人的皮质厚度与阅读能力之间的关系，但在较年轻的年龄组中则不然。令人惊讶的是，与数学没有这种关系，因此阅读和数学结果之间没有收敛。