Infants’ Understanding of Object-Directed Action: An Interdisciplinary Synthesis

Abstract

Recognizing that the object-directed actions of others are governed by goals and intentions is a crucial component of human interaction. These actions often occur rapidly and without explanation, yet we learn from and predict the actions of others with remarkable speed and accuracy, even during the first year of life. This review paper will serve as a bridge between several disparate literatures that, we suggest, can each contribute to our understanding of how infants interpret action. Specifically, we provide a review not just of research on infant goal attribution per se, but also incorporate findings from studies on the mirror neuron system and infant object cognition. The integration of these various research approaches allows for a novel construal of the extents and limits of early goal attribution – one in which the importance of the entire action context is considered – and points to specific future research directions.

The Psychomotor Profile in Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders: Clinical Assessments and Implications for Therapy

“…Extensive researches have been carried out about their evolution and their relationship with the language, precisely because in humans, mirror neurons are found near to Broca's area. The hypothesis that human language evolved through the information transmitted with gestural performances and finally the mirror system has been able to understand and encode/decode is considered scientifically valid and supports the discussion of the present study, in particular that understanding the intentions of others and learning through imitation rooted in emotional and physical development, so it is from there that in many cases should start the therapeutic intervention in order to activate the mechanisms extinguished or to start-up unreached skills [30].…”

When the Sound Becomes the Goal. 4E Cognition and Teleomusicality in Early Infancy

“…This helps reveal the bidirectiona l way action and perception influence each other (Thelen, 1989 , 1994 ; Thelen et al, 2001 ; Gerson and Woodward, 2014a , b ; Gerson et al, 2015a ). As Kanakogi and Itakura ( 2011 ) suggest, “the developmental onset of infants' ability to understand an action, reflected by the ability to predict the goal of others' action, is synchronized with the developmental onset of their own ability to perform that action, and […] there is developmental correspondence relationship between the ability to predict the goal of an action and the ability to perform that same motor action” (see also Gergely et al, 1995 ; van der Meer et al, 1995 ; Woodward, 1998 ; Daum et al, 2011 ; Cannon et al, 2012 , 2016 ; Robson and Kuhlmeier, 2016 ). With this in mind, we provide next a conceptual review of the main findings concerning Mirror and Canonical neurons, and consider how this research might align with and support the action-oriented, and goal-based, approach to early musical development outlined in the following sections.…”

Theory of Mind

“…A substantial literature has built up around specifying the conditions under which children appear to impute intentions and goals to actors in simple situations (see e.g., Robson & Kuhlmeier, 2016 for a recent review). Of these, perhaps one of the most intriguing concerns whether the action or goal that is being observed is one that can also within infants' own action repertoires.…”