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 Germanscholars 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 ina conversation, without noticing...

actions are results of ideas about actions, triggered by theperception of the action or its image in mind

ideomotor reaction happens �unhesitatingly and immediately�

the e�ect induced during sole observation of the movementmight not necessarily lead to action (might be suppressed)


Common Coding Theory

Prinz (1997), Hommel et al. (2001)

the perception of action automatically activates its motorcomponent 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 amotor act as in its execution


Motor resonance and the EEG mu-rhythm

mu-rhytm:

EEG oscillation with dominant frequencies in the 8�13 and15�25 Hz bands (alpha like)typical for motor restdesynchronizes/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 asole 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 bandstypical for motor restgets desynchronized, diminished, or vanishes when the subjectobserves motor acts

the magnitude of the desynchronization points to the degree ofunderstanding or "reliving" the observed movement


Motor Resonance and E�ectors

caused also by non-human, but human-like e�ectors, like arobotic 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 signi�cantlyhigher when observing crawling in comparison to walking


Guess Who's Doing That

people have better judgment about the outcome of an actionwhen observing themselves

Knoblich and Flach (2001): experiments with throwing darts(video paradigm)

Knoblich et al. (2002): experiments with writing digits(�nished and un�nished digits)


E�ects of Pro�ciency

Repp and Knoblich (2007): pianists judge sequences ofambiguous tones (Tritone paradox) according to the directionof the produced movement (from left to right and vice versa)

Aglioti et al. (2008): professional sportsmen judge better theoutcome of the action even compared skilled observers(couches, journalists)

However, this principle does not apply when viewing staticimages (Sebanz and Shi�rar ,2009)(mirror neurons are not triggered by static images as well)

Cross et al. (2006): when professional dancers learned a newmovement the activity triggered by the observation of thismovement in IPL and frontal premotor cortex graduallyincreased


Motor Resonance and Ideomotor Theory: Conclusions

the more closely the observed action maps onto the observer'sown motor repertoire, the more accurate will be the observer'sprediction of the course and the result of the action

motor preparation enhances the performance in perceptualtasks

stimulus-response compatibility (facilitation of reaction on thebasis of congruence with the stimulus)

ideomotor action: involuntary movement that tends to arisewhen observing another's performance

in�uence of familiarity

in�uence of pro�ciency and praxis

in�uence 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 theworld

inverse: reversely activating actions that could possibly lead tothe observed situation

work together

a possible solution to the problem of agency: "who does theaction?"


The End

Thank you for your attention

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Grounded Cognition: Motor Resonance