Different mental rotation strategies reflected in the rotation related negativity

Abstract

In a mental rotation task of objects, typically, reaction time (RT) increases and the rotation related negativity (RRN) increases in amplitude with increasing angles of rotation. However, in a mental rotation task of hands, different RT profiles can be observed for outward and inward rotated hands. In the present study, we examined the neurophysiological correlates of these asymmetries in the RT profiles. We used a mental rotation task with stimuli of left and right hands. In line with previous studies, the behavioral results showed a linear increase in RT for outward rotations, but not for inward rotations as a function of angular disparity. Importantly, the ERP results revealed an RRN for outward rotated stimuli, but not for inward rotated stimuli. This is the first study to show that the behaviorally observed differences in a mental rotation task of hands is also reflected at the neurophysiological level.

Effects of Hand Orientation on Motor Imagery - Event Related Potentials Suggest Kinesthetic Motor Imagery to Solve the Hand Laterality Judgment Task

“…Instead, Parsons [10] found that participants took longer to correctly judge hand laterality when they were presented with laterally compared to medially rotated pictures of hands. Since then, this finding has been repeatedly replicated [10-16]. This consistent observation was taken as evidence that participants internally simulate a movement of the hand - thus, engage in MI - to solve the task.…”

“…Thus, the P300 becomes less positive as the mentally rotated angle increases. A number of variables have been found to influence RRN amplitude during the HLJ task [14,16]. First, the RRN is more marked for palm view compared to back view pictures of hands.…”

“…The current study employed a modified version of the HLJ task. Stimuli were selected from a stimulus set previously used by our research group and reported to elicit the MI specific rotation effect on palm view stimuli [16,33]. Because previous studies have repeatedly demonstrated RT effects, we employed a delayed response version of this task to avoid EEG artefacts.…”

Strategy selection versus flexibility: Using eye-trackers to investigate strategy use during mental rotation.

“…Strategy selection pertaining to spatial reasoning has been extensively studied in the mental rotation literature (Hegarty, 2010;Khooshabeh, Hegarty, & Shipley, 2013;Kozhevnikov, Hegarty, & Mayer, 2002;Meneghetti, Cardillo, Mammarella, Caviola, & Borella, 2016;Shepard & Metzler, 1971;Ter Horst, Jongsma, Janssen, van Lier, & Steenbergen, 2012). For several decades' researchers investigating strategy selection during spatial thinking tasks have attempted to operationalize the strategies that participants' use, but an inconsistent vocabulary has been employed.…”

Anatomically plausible illusory posture affects mental rotation of body parts

“…medial-over-lateral advantage (MOLA; Funk & Brugger, 2008), MR is faster for rotations toward the midsagittal plane (medial rotations) and longer for rotations away from that plane (lateral rotations; Coslett, Medina, Kliot, & Burkey, 2010;Funk & Brugger, 2008;Gawryszewski, Silvados-Santos, Santos-Silva, Lameira, & Pereira, 2007;Parsons, 1994;ter Horst, Jongsma, Janssen, van Lier, & Steenbergen, 2012). These findings suggest that subjects internally simulate the movement of their own body part in order to match the position of the stimulus (Parsons, 1994;Sirigu & Duhamel, 2001) by adopting motor imagery in first-person perspective (for a review, see Corradi-Dell'Acqua & Tessari, 2010) and thus rendering the imagery sensitive to anatomical constraints (Fourkas, Ionta, & Aglioti, 2006).…”