Distinct functional roles of the mirror neuron system and the mentalizing system

Geiger, A.; Bente, Gary; Lammers, Sebastian; Tepest, Ralf; Roth, Daniel; Bzdok, Danilo; Vogeley, Kai

doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.116102

Cited by 24 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 87 publications

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“…Moreover, our study implied that the MNS basic function is not only a motor controller since participants remained still and simply observed the action will not requiring any extra motor control function in this process (OBS tasks), the result indicated improvements in Oxy-Hb and Deoxy-Hb in action observation task after exercise to support moderate exercise was indeed stimulating the action understanding function. Similar to the argument mentioned above, some researchers also argued that parts of MNS (dorsal part of PMC) was responded by the action understanding, but the theory of mind or social cognition function is control by MENT (dorsal part of mPFC and the IFG as another part of MNS) (Geiger et al, 2019), even this statement is true, the result from our study indicated that exercise might benefit social cognition is still valid. Since in IFG region, the activation of low-level participants was still improved.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 81%

“…However, several studies were skeptical about the role that the MNS played in social cognition, arguing that the MNS was simply the motor controller and did not include action understanding which is one of the most important basic functions in social cognition (Baird et al, 2011;Hickok et al, 2011b). Besides, other studies declared that the dorsal part of the premotor cortex in MNS did play a role in action understanding, but only the dorsomedial prefrontal of MNS which was called the mentalizing system (MENT) activated by the social relevant tasks (Spunt and Lieberman, 2012;Geiger et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effect of Acute Moderate-Intensity Exercise on the Mirror Neuron System: Role of Cardiovascular Fitness Level

Wang

et al. 2020

Front. Psychol.

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Objectives: The aims of this study were to use functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to determine whether cardiovascular fitness levels modulate the activation of the mirror neuron system (MNS) under table-setting tasks in non-exercise situation, to replicate the study that positive effect of acute moderate-intensity exercise on the MNS and investigate whether cardiovascular fitness levels modulates the effect of exercise on the activation of the MNS. Methods: Thirty-six healthy college-aged participants completed a maximal graded exercise test (GXT) and were categorized as high, moderate, or low cardiovascular fitness. Participants then performed table-setting tasks including an action execution task (EXEC) and action observation task (OBS) prior to (PRE) and after (POST) either a rest condition (CTRL) or a cycling exercise condition (EXP). The EXP condition consisted of a 5-min warm-up, 15-min moderate-intensity exercise (65% VO 2max), and 5-min cool-down. Results: No significant differences were observed for Oxy-Hb and Deoxy-Hb between different cardiovascular fitness levels in the EXEC or OBS tasks in the non-exercise session. But there were significant improvements of oxygenated hemoglobin (Oxy-Hb) in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and pre-motor area (PMC) regions under the OBS task following the acute moderate exercise. Particularly, the improvements (Post-Pre) of Oxy-Hb were mainly observed in high and low fitness individuals. There was also a significant improvement of deoxygenated hemoglobin (Deoxy-Hb) in the IPL region under the OBS task. The following analysis indicated that exercise improved Deoxy-Hb in high fitness individuals. Conclusion: This study indicated that the activation of MNS was not modulated by the cardiovascular fitness levels in the non-exercise situation. We replicated the previous study that moderate exercise improved activation of MNS; we also provided the first empirical evidence that moderate-intensity exercise positively affects the MNS activation in college students of high and low cardiovascular fitness levels.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 81%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of Acute Moderate-Intensity Exercise on the Mirror Neuron System: Role of Cardiovascular Fitness Level

Wang

et al. 2020

Front. Psychol.

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“…In typically developing (TD) individuals, inferences about the mental states of conspecifics are made automatically, most of the time unconsciously, in everyday social interactions. On a neural level, MENT is systematically activated when deducing inner states from human motion (Blake & Shiffrar, 2007; de Lange et al, 2008;Geiger et al, 2019;Spunt et al, 2010Spunt et al, , 2011Spunt & Lieberman, 2012a, 2012bTroje, 2013). Vogeley (2017) proposed the interplay between MNS and MENT to be divided into detection and evaluation, where the MNS serves the detection of bodily signals and the MENT serves the evaluation of inner states of the observed individual(s) (Vogeley, 2017).…”

Section: Attributing Inner Statesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quantitative Analysis of Motor Behavior in Adults with High Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder

Lammers¹

2020

Preprint

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Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is an umbrella term for a range of conditions that share core symptoms such as restricted interests, repetitive behaviors and deficits in social interaction and communication. Motor impairments in ASD have been investigated mainly in children and adolescents. Although the results are equivocal, some researchers proposed motor impairments to be a core symptom of ASD. Research in adults with ASD remains scarce, but existing evidence suggests that an age-related decrease in motor symptoms is likely. In addition, the level of functioning may have an influence on motor skills. In the current project, motion capture technology was used to quantify motor behavior of adults with and without high functioning ASD. Participants were recorded (1) while performing neutral walking movements, and (2) while performing mood-influenced everyday activities. The results show no significant differences in walking movements between participants with or without ASD. In contrast, the results of the mood-influenced movements show significant group differences. Together, these results suggest that general motor skills in adults with high functioning ASD are not impaired, while the production of nonverbal bodily cues is significantly different. These bodily cues carry information (e.g. about mood) that are relevant for nonverbal communication. It has been shown that the recognition of perceived movements increases when movements are more similar to the movements of the perceiver. The current results thus show that the difficulties in nonverbal communication between persons with and without ASD may stem from differences in movement profiles.

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“…This particular selection was intended for a functional neuroimaging study where task difficulty across conditions was ideally balanced between both tasks (Geiger et al, 2019). We therefore conducted an online survey using the remaining 83 clips to receive an additional annotation for these animations.…”

Section: Homogenizing For Recognition Ratesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Applying this data to further homogenize the stimulus set we ended with a fully balanced subset of 32 animation clips (eight variations of each of four possible combinations: two actions × two moods). This specific subset was prepared for a particular fMRI study that focused on the differential activation of the action observation network and the mentalizing system (also called theory of mind system) as related to action and emotion recognition (Geiger et al, 2019). The current article introduces the ACASS database (Annotated Character Animation Stimulus Set) and reports the details of stimulus generation, the algorithm used for feature extraction, as well as the exemplary stepwise stimulus selection procedure leading to the subset(s).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Introducing ACASS: An Annotated Character Animation Stimulus Set for Controlled (e)Motion Perception Studies

et al. 2019

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Distinct functional roles of the mirror neuron system and the mentalizing system

Cited by 24 publications

References 87 publications

Effect of Acute Moderate-Intensity Exercise on the Mirror Neuron System: Role of Cardiovascular Fitness Level

Effect of Acute Moderate-Intensity Exercise on the Mirror Neuron System: Role of Cardiovascular Fitness Level

Quantitative Analysis of Motor Behavior in Adults with High Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder

Introducing ACASS: An Annotated Character Animation Stimulus Set for Controlled (e)Motion Perception Studies

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