Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-06T10:04:07.996Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

4 - A neural architecture for imitation and intentional relations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 December 2009

By
Marco Iacoboni ,
Jonas Kaplan  and
Stephen Wilson
Edited by
Chrystopher L. Nehaniv  and
Kerstin Dautenhahn
Marco Iacoboni
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Neuropsychiatric Institute and Brain Research Institute, University of California, UK
Jonas Kaplan
Affiliation:
FPR-UCLA Center for Culture, Brain and Development, Department of Psychology, University of California USA,
Stephen Wilson
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Brain Research Institute, University of California USA,
Chrystopher L. Nehaniv
Affiliation:
University of Hertfordshire
Kerstin Dautenhahn
Affiliation:
University of Hertfordshire
Get access

Summary

Imitation is an important form of learning, facilitating the acquisition of many skills without the time-consuming process of trial-and-error learning. Imitation is also associated with the ability to develop social skills and understand the goals, the intentions and the feelings of other people (Meltzoff and Prinz, 2002). The neural underpinnings of imitation and their possible evolutionary precursors have been recently investigated with different approaches, including neurological investigations, brain imaging, single cell recordings and computational models. This chapter discusses a neural architecture for imitation comprising superior temporal cortex, the rostral part of the posterior parietal cortex and inferior frontal cortex. The main thesis of the chapter is that the central role of imitation in the development of social skills is due to the functional properties of this neural architecture. These properties allow a common framework for third person knowledge (i.e. the observation of actions of others) and first person knowledge (i.e. internal motor plans).

Neurophysiology

Neurons in the superior temporal sulcus (STS) respond to moving biological stimuli, such as hands, faces and bodies (Jellema et al., 2002). The responses of some of these neurons occur only when the body or body part is engaged in goal-oriented actions, for instance when a hand reaches and grasps an object. The sight of a hand reaching toward the object but not grasping it will not activate these STS neurons. Point-light versions of the complete action, i.e. a hand reaching and grasping an object, however, do activate STS cells.

Type
Chapter
Information
Imitation and Social Learning in Robots, Humans and Animals
Behavioural, Social and Communicative Dimensions
 , pp. 71 - 88
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allison, T., Puce, A. and McCarthy, G. (2000). Social perception from visual cues: role of the STS region. Trends Cogn. Sci., 4, 267–78.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Arbib, M. A. (2002). The mirror system, imitation, and the evolution of language. In Imitation in Animals and Artifacts, Dautenhahn, K. and Nehaniv, C. (eds.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 229–80.Google Scholar
Augustine, J. R. (1996). Circuitry and functional aspects of the insular lobes in primates including humans. Brain Res. Rev., 2, 229–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barresi, J. and Moore, C. (1996). Intentional relations and social understanding. Behav. Brain Sci., 19, 107–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bates, E., Wilson, S. M., Saygin, A. P., Dick, F., Sereno, M. I., Knight, R. T. and Dronkers, N. F. (2003). Voxel-based lesion-symptom mapping. Nat. Neurosci., 6, 448–50.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beer, R. D. (2000). Dynamical approaches to cognitive science. Trends Cogn. Sci., 4, 91–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Calvert, G. A., Campbell, R. and Brammer, M. J. (2000). Evidence from functional magnetic resonance imaging of crossmodal binding in the human heteromodal cortex. Curr. Biol., 10, 649–57.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Carr, L., Iacoboni, M., Dubeau, M. C., Mazziotta, J. C. and Lenzi, G. L. (2003). Neural mechanisms of empathy in humans: a relay from neural systems for imitation to limbic areas. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 100, 5497–5502.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Catani, M., Jones, D. K. and Ffytche, D. H. (2005). Perisylvian language networks of the human brain. Ann. Neurol., 57, 8–16.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chartrand, T. L. and Bargh, J. A. (1999). The chameleon effect: the perception-behavior link and social interaction. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol., 76, 893–910.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Demiris, J. and Hayes, G. (2002). Imitation as a dual-route process featuring predictive and learning components: a biologically plausible computational model. In Imitation in Animals and Artifacts, Dautenhahn, K. and Nehaniv, C. (eds.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 327–61.Google Scholar
Desmurget, M. and Grafton, S. (2000). Forward modeling allows feedback control for fast reaching movements. Trends Cogn. Sci., 4, 423–31.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Doya, K. (2000). Complementary roles of basal ganglia and cerebellum in learning and motor control. Curr. Opin. Neurobiol., 10, 732–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fadiga, L., Craighero, L., Buccino, G. and Rizzolatti, G. (2002). Speech listening specifically modulates the excitability of tongue muscles: a TMS study. Eur. J. Neurosci., 15, 399–402.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fogassi, L. and Gallese, V. (2002). The neural correlates of action understanding in non-human primates. In Mirror Neurons and the Evolution of Brain and Language, Stamenov, M. and Gallese, V. (eds.), Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 13–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fregnac, Y. and Shulz, D. E. (1999). Activity-dependent regulation of receptive field properties of cat area 17 by supervised Hebbian learning. J. Neurobiol., 41, 69–82.3.0.CO;2-1>CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gallese, V., Fadiga, L., Fogassi, L. and Rizzolatti, G. (1996). Action recognition in the premotor cortex. Brain, 119, 593–609.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gallese, V. and Goldman, A. (1998). Mirror neurons and the simulation theory of mind-reading. Trends Cogn. Sci., 2, 493–501.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Geschwind, N. (1965). Disconnexion syndromes in animals and man. I. Brain, 88, 237–94.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goodglass, H. (1993) Understanding Aphasia. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Google ScholarPubMed
Green, E. and Howes, D. H. (1978). The nature of conduction aphasia: a study of anatomic and clinical features and of underlying mechanisms. In Studies in Neurolinguistics, Whitaker, A. and Whitaker, H. A. (eds.). San Diego, CA: Academic Press, 123–56.Google Scholar
Grush, R. (2001). The architecture of representation. In Philosophy and the Neurosciences, Bechtel, W., Mundale, J. and Stufflebeam, R. S. (eds.). Malden, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Haruno, M., Wolpert, D. M. and Kawato, M. (2001). Mosaic model for sensorimotor learning and control. Neural Comput., 13, 2201–20.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Haselager, P., deGroot, A. and Rappard, H. (2003). Representationalism vs. anti-representationalism: a debate for the sake of appearance. Philos. Psychol., 16, 5–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hatfield, E., Cacioppo, J. T. and Rapson, R. L. (1994). Emotional Contagion. Paris: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Haugeland, J. (1991). Representational genera. In Philosophy and Connectionist Theory, Ramsey, W. M., Stich, S. P. and Rumelhart, D. E. (eds.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Heiser, M., Iacoboni, M., Maeda, F., Marcus, J. and Mazziotta, J. C. (2003). The essential role of Broca's area in imitation. Eur. J. Neurosci., 17, 1123–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Heyes, C. (2005). Imitation by association. In Perspectives on Imitation: From Mirror Neurons to Memes, Hurley, S. and Chater, N. (eds.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Hogan, J. M. and Diederich, J. (2001). Recruitment learning of Boolean functions in sparse random networks. Int. J. Neural Syst., 11, 537–59.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Iacoboni, M., Koski, L. M., Brass, M., Bekkering, H., Woods, R. P., Dubeau, M. C., Mazziotta, J. C. and Rizzolatti, G. (2001). Reafferent copies of imitated actions in the right superior temporal cortex. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 98, 13995–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Iacoboni, M., Woods, R. P., Brass, M., Bekkering, H., Mazziotta, J. C. and Rizzolatti, G. (1999). Cortical mechanisms of human imitation. Science, 286, 2526–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Imamizu, H., Kuroda, T., Miyauchi, S., Yoshioka, T. and Kawato, M. (2003). Modular organization of internal models of tools in the human cerebellum. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 100, 5461–6.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Imamizu, H., Miyauchi, S., Tamada, T., Sasaki, Y., Takino, R., Putz, B., Yoshioka, T. and Kawato, M. (2000). Human cerebellar activity reflecting an acquired internal model of a new tool. Nature, 403, 192–5.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jellema, T., Baker, C. I., Oram, M. W. and Perrett, D. I. (2002). Cell populations in the banks of the superior temporal sulcus of the macaque and imitation. In The Imitative Mind: Development, Evolution and Brain Bases, Meltzoff, A. N. and Prinz, W. (eds.). New York, NY, US: Cambridge University Press, 267–290.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kalaska, J. F., Caminiti, R. and Georgopoulos, A. P. (1983). Cortical mechanisms related to the direction of two-dimensional arm movements: relations in parietal area 5 and comparison with motor cortex. Exp. Brain Res., 51, 247–60.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kalaska, J. F., Cohen, D. A., Prud'homme, M. and Hyde, M. L. (1990). Parietal area 5 neuronal activity encodes movement kinematics, not movement dynamics. Exp. Brain Res., 80, 351–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koski, L., Iacoboni, M., Dubeau, M. C., Woods, R. P. and Mazziotta, J. C. (2003). Modulation of cortical activity during different imitative behaviors. J. Neurophysiol., 89, 460–71.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Koski, L., Wohlschlager, A., Bekkering, H., Woods, R. P., Dubeau, M. C., Mazziotta, J. C. and Iacoboni, M. (2002). Modulation of motor and premotor activity during imitation of target-directed actions. Cereb. Cortex, 12, 847–55.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Meltzoff, A. N. and Prinz, W. (2002). The Imitative Mind: Development, Evolution and Brain Bases. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miall, R. C., Reckess, G. Z. and Imamizu, H. (2001). The cerebellum coordinates eye and hand tracking movements. Nat. Neurosci., 4, 638–44.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mohr, J. P. (1976). Broca's area and Broca's aphasia. In Studies in Neurolinguistics, Whitaker, A., Whitaker, H. A. (eds.). San Diego, CA: Academic Press, 201–35.Google Scholar
Molnar-Szakacs, I., Iacoboni, M., Koski, L. and Maziotta, J. C. (2005). Functional segregation within pars opercularis of the inferior frontal gyrus: evidence from fMRI studies of imitation and action observation. Cerebral Cortex, 15, 986–94.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nadel, J. and Butterworth, G. (1999). Imitation in Infancy. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Newell, A. (1991). Unified Theories of Cognition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Paus, T., Perry, D., Zatorre, R., Worsley, K. and Evans, A. (1996). Modulation of cerebral blood flow in the human auditory cortex during speech: role of motor-to-sensory discharges. Eur. J. Neurosci., 8, 2236–46.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pennartz, C. M. (1997). Reinforcement learning by Hebbian synapses with adaptive thresholds. Neuroscience, 81, 303–19.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rizzolatti, G. and Arbib, M. (1998). Language within our grasp. Trends Neurosci, 21, 188–94.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rizzolatti, G., Camarda, R., Fogassi, M., Gentilucci, M., Luppino, G., Matelli, M. (1988). Functional organization of inferior area 6 in the macaque monkey. II. Area F5 and the control of distal movements. Exp. Brain. Res., 71, 491–507.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rizzolatti, G., Fogassi, L., Gallese, V. (2001). Neurophysiological mechanisms underlying action understanding and imitation. Nat. Rev. Neurosci., 2, 661–70.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Scott, S. K., Blank, C. C., Rosen, S. and Wise, R. J. (2000). Identification of a pathway for intelligible speech in the left temporal lobe. Brain, 123(12), 2400–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seltzer, B. and Pandya, D. N. (1994). Parietal, temporal, and occipital projections to cortex of the superior temporal sulcus in the rhesus monkey: a retrograde tracer study. J. Comp. Neurol., 343, 445–63.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tamada, T., Miyauchi, S., Imamizu, H., Yoshioka, T. and Kawato, M. (1999). Cerebro-cerebellar functional connectivity revealed by the laterality index in tool-use learning. Neuroreport, 10, 325–31.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wernicke, C. (1874). Der Aphasiche Symptomenkomplex. Breslau, Poland: Cohen & Weigert.Google Scholar
Wolpert, D. M., Doya, K. and Kawato, M. (2003). A unifying computational framework for motor control and social interaction. Philos. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B. Biol. Sci., 358, 593–602.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wolpert, D. M. and Kawato, M. (1998). Multiple paired forward and inverse models for motor control. Neural Networks, 11, 1317–29.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wood, J. N. and Grafman, J. (2003). Human prefrontal cortex: processing and representational perspectives. Nat. Rev. Neurosci., 4, 139–47.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • A neural architecture for imitation and intentional relations
    • By Marco Iacoboni, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Neuropsychiatric Institute and Brain Research Institute, University of California, UK, Jonas Kaplan, FPR-UCLA Center for Culture, Brain and Development, Department of Psychology, University of California USA,, Stephen Wilson, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Brain Research Institute, University of California USA,
  • Edited by Chrystopher L. Nehaniv, University of Hertfordshire, Kerstin Dautenhahn, University of Hertfordshire
  • Book: Imitation and Social Learning in Robots, Humans and Animals
  • Online publication: 10 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511489808.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • A neural architecture for imitation and intentional relations
    • By Marco Iacoboni, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Neuropsychiatric Institute and Brain Research Institute, University of California, UK, Jonas Kaplan, FPR-UCLA Center for Culture, Brain and Development, Department of Psychology, University of California USA,, Stephen Wilson, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Brain Research Institute, University of California USA,
  • Edited by Chrystopher L. Nehaniv, University of Hertfordshire, Kerstin Dautenhahn, University of Hertfordshire
  • Book: Imitation and Social Learning in Robots, Humans and Animals
  • Online publication: 10 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511489808.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • A neural architecture for imitation and intentional relations
    • By Marco Iacoboni, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Neuropsychiatric Institute and Brain Research Institute, University of California, UK, Jonas Kaplan, FPR-UCLA Center for Culture, Brain and Development, Department of Psychology, University of California USA,, Stephen Wilson, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, Brain Research Institute, University of California USA,
  • Edited by Chrystopher L. Nehaniv, University of Hertfordshire, Kerstin Dautenhahn, University of Hertfordshire
  • Book: Imitation and Social Learning in Robots, Humans and Animals
  • Online publication: 10 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511489808.007
Available formats
×