Abstract
The human brain is a patchwork of different functionally specialized areas. What determines this functional organization of cortex? One hypothesis is that innate connectivity patterns shape functional organization by setting up a scaffold upon which functional specialization can later take place. We tested this hypothesis here by asking whether the visual word form area (VWFA), an experience-driven region that only becomes selective to visual words after gaining literacy, was already connected to proto language networks in neonates scanned within one week of birth. We found that neonates showed adult-like functional connectivity, and observed that i) the VWFA connected more strongly with frontal and temporal language regions than regions adjacent to these language regions (e.g., frontal attentional demand, temporal auditory regions), and ii) language regions connected more strongly with the putative VWFA than other adjacent ventral visual regions that also show foveal bias (e.g. fusiform face area, FFA). Object regions showed similar connectivity with language areas as the VWFA but not with face areas in neonates, arguing against prior hypotheses that the region that becomes the VWFA starts out with a selectivity for faces. These data suggest that the location of the VWFA is earmarked at birth due to its connectivity with the language network, providing novel evidence that innate connectivity instructs the later refinement of cortex.