Body maps in the infant brain: implications for neurodevelopmental disabilities

Abstract

This review and synthesis discusses recent work that has utilized brain imaging methods, such as the electroencephalogram (EEG) and magnetoencephalogram, to provide insights into the ways that the body is represented in the infant brain. One aspect of body representation concerns somatotopic maps of the body surface in somatosensory cortex. A good deal is known about the properties of these maps in adults, but there has been relatively little developmental work. Recent studies have provided new insights into the organization of infant neural body maps and have laid the foundations for examining their plasticity in relation to behavioral development. Other work has suggested that neural body maps may be involved in the registration of correspondences between self and other, with implications for early social development. Here, body representations are discussed in the context of preterm birth and autism spectrum disorder, providing novel perspectives relevant to developmental medicine and child neurology. What this paper adds ●Somatotopic body maps develop prenatally through intrinsic and activity‐dependent mechanisms. ●There is increasing interest in understanding postnatal plasticity in body maps. ●Body representations may be involved in the registration of preverbal, interpersonal relationships.

Proprioception, Emotion and Social Responsiveness in Children with Developmental Disorders: An Exploratory Study in Autism Spectrum Disorder, Cerebral Palsy and Different Neurodevelopmental Situations

“…In particular, the perception of bodily signals has been pointed out as a facilitator of the use of strategies to regulate emotions and the ductile selection of the adequate behavior according to social context in neurotypical individuals [ 51 ]. The perception of body posture, kinesthesia and limb position are regarded as important factors for the regulation of psychological states in neurotypical populations [ 9 , 10 , 11 ]. It has also been proposed that inadequate proprioceptive information in neurodevelopmental disorders may generate a distorted regulation of somatic states implicated in the construction of emotional processes, provoking deficiencies in the emotional adaptation to the environment [ 3 , 5 ].…”

“…For instance, when frowning, the proprioceptive signal from facial muscles affects one’s emotional state, and makes individuals judge unpleasant stimuli as more negative [ 8 ]. Furthermore, the encoding of limb position and the creation of somatotopic maps have been related to the generation of behavior and social interactions [ 9 ]. In this sense, embodiment theories stress the role of sensory mechanisms in psychological and social processing, for example, the role of perception of body posture in bodily empathy [ 10 , 11 ].…”

“…Although both proprioceptive and emotion regulation impairments have been reported in children with neurodevelopmental disorders [ 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 ], little research has investigated the interaction of these processes. Given the role of sensory information in developing appropriate emotional responses and social interaction [ 9 ], it is plausible that misleading proprioceptive information could generate “internal fake news” and provoke inappropriate or defective emotional adaptation to the environment [ 5 ]. The association between proprioception and emotion regulation has previously been reported in cerebellar or vestibular disorders in adults [ 5 ].…”

Effects of maternal mental health on prenatal movement profiles in twins and singletons

“…Although there are no conclusive findings about the exact developmental timing of the emergence of the sense of a bodily self, studies of brain responses to touch stimulation in neonates born preterm and at term have suggested that a somatotopic cortical pattern develops prenatally 29 . Studies on the ontogeny of human body perception in infants suggest that a pre‐reflective, non‐conceptual form of bodily self‐awareness, a primitive sense of self or ‘minimal self’, is already present in the first months of life 30 and that the minimal self‐development might be influenced by prenatal experiences including maternal stress, depression and anxiety.…”

Could Gait Biomechanics Become a Marker of Atypical Neuronal Circuitry in Human Development?—The Example of Autism Spectrum Disorder

“…An intact neural motor system is mandatory for perception-action coupling, as well as social understanding of the motor intentions, interpreted as visuo-motor resonance (Becchio and Castiello, 2012). These cognitive and somatosensory functions participate to the maturation of the body map representation already in infancy (Marshall and Meltzoff, 2020), and to reciprocal social cognition (Cook, 2016), which could not deploy without reliable sensory-motor system functioning.…”