Grounded Cognition: Motor Resonance

Motor Resonance
Kristína Rebrová
[Grounded Cognition 2011]
Kristína Rebrová [Grounded Cognition 2011] Motor Resonance

Motor Resonance
partial activation of motor circuits without any (apparent)
motor activity
triggered by various modalities: visual, auditory, linguistic
might provide us with a simulation mechanism -
understanding, prediction, empathy

Ideomotor Theory
William James (1980) [originally developed by German
scholars in early 19th century, see Stock and Stock, 2004]
there are many behavioral routines we execute subconsciously,
for instance when we eat raisins out of a cake, fully engaged in
a conversation, without noticing...
actions are results of ideas about actions, triggered by the
perception of the action or its image in mind
ideomotor reaction happens unhesitatingly and immediately
the eect induced during sole observation of the movement
might not necessarily lead to action (might be suppressed)

Common Coding Theory
Prinz (1997), Hommel et al. (2001)
the perception of action automatically activates its motor
component and vice versa
an action and its perceptual aspects are (on a higher level)
represented within common domain (common codes)
a mean for sensorimotor simulation (Barsalou, 1999;
Jeannerod, 2001; Wolpert et al., 2003)
same neural mechanisms are involved in mental imagery of a
motor act as in its execution

Motor resonance and the EEG mu-rhythm
mu-rhytm:
EEG oscillation with dominant frequencies in the 813 and
1525 Hz bands (alpha like)
typical for motor rest
desynchronizes/supresses not only when subject produces,
but also observes action
rst indirect evidence of mirror neurons in humans

Motor Resonance and EEG mu-rhythm
motor resonance is a partial activation of motor areas during a
sole observation of a movement
Cohen-Seat et al. (1954), Gastaut and Bert (1954)
mu rhythm
an EEG oscillation in 8 to 13 Hz and 20 Hz bands
typical for motor rest
gets desynchronized, diminished, or vanishes when the subject
observes motor acts
the magnitude of the desynchronization points to the degree of
understanding or reliving the observed movement

Motor Resonance and Eectors
caused also by non-human, but human-like eectors, like a
robotic arm (Oberman and Ramachandran, 2007)

Motor Resonance and Motor Repertoire
motor resonance appears even in infants Van Elk et al. (2008)
it is selective to the movements inside the motor repertoire
responses of infants of 14-16 months of age were signicantly
higher when observing crawling in comparison to walking

Guess Who's Doing That
people have better judgment about the outcome of an action
when observing themselves
Knoblich and Flach (2001): experiments with throwing darts
(video paradigm)
Knoblich et al. (2002): experiments with writing digits
(nished and unnished digits)

Eects of Prociency
Repp and Knoblich (2007): pianists judge sequences of
ambiguous tones (Tritone paradox) according to the direction
of the produced movement (from left to right and vice versa)
Aglioti et al. (2008): professional sportsmen judge better the
outcome of the action even compared skilled observers
(couches, journalists)
However, this principle does not apply when viewing static
images (Sebanz and Shirar ,2009)
(mirror neurons are not triggered by static images as well)
Cross et al. (2006): when professional dancers learned a new
movement the activity triggered by the observation of this
movement in IPL and frontal premotor cortex gradually
increased

Motor Resonance and Ideomotor Theory: Conclusions
the more closely the observed action maps onto the observer's
own motor repertoire, the more accurate will be the observer's
prediction of the course and the result of the action
motor preparation enhances the performance in perceptual
tasks
stimulus-response compatibility (facilitation of reaction on the
basis of congruence with the stimulus)
ideomotor action: involuntary movement that tends to arise
when observing another's performance
inuence of familiarity
inuence of prociency and praxis
inuence of training
various motor laws imply for perception and imagery of action

Forward and Inverse Models
Wolpert and Kawato (1998), Wolpert et al. (2003)
forward: to generate predictions about the next state of the
world
inverse: reversely activating actions that could possibly lead to
the observed situation
work together
a possible solution to the problem of agency: who does the
action?

The End
Thank you for your attention
kristina.rebrova@gmail.com

Grounded Cognition: Motor Resonance

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