Facultade de Ciencias do Deporte e a Educacin Fsica (INEF Galicia), Departamento de Educacion Fisica e Deportiva, Avd. Ernesto Che Guevara 121, Pazos-Lins, 15179 Oleiros, A Coruna, Spain.
Neurosci Lett. 2011 Apr 15;493(3):102-6. doi: 10.1016/j.neulet.2011.02.014. Epub 2011 Feb 24.
There are human cortical areas that fire both when a person executes an action and when he observes someone performing a similar action. The observer activates a motor program that resembles the observed action. However, it is not known whether the motor program activated via action observation is muscle specific. In this study, using simple pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) applied over the primary motor cortex (M1), we investigated whether the Mirror System activates a muscle specific motor program, or codes the observed action in terms of its goal. The results showed that when subjects observed a static effector in front of an object, cortical excitability was enhanced even in muscles not involved in the observed movement, but that are able to achieve the goal of the action. When there was an effector-object interaction the motor program activated via action observation is muscle specific. These results suggest that when subjects observe an object related action there is an activation of a motor program based on the observed action goal, that is transformed into a muscle specific program when the subject shows an effector-object interaction.
当一个人执行一个动作时，以及当他观察到有人执行类似动作时，人类大脑皮层的某些区域都会产生兴奋。观察者会激活一个与观察到的动作相似的运动程序。然而，目前尚不清楚通过动作观察激活的运动程序是否具有肌肉特异性。在这项研究中，我们使用简单的脉冲经颅磁刺激（TMS）作用于初级运动皮层（M1），来研究镜像系统是否激活了具有肌肉特异性的运动程序，或者是否根据观察到的动作的目标对其进行编码。结果表明，当被试观察位于物体前的静态效应器时，即使在未参与观察到的运动的肌肉中，皮质兴奋性也会增强，但这些肌肉能够实现动作的目标。当存在效应器-物体相互作用时，通过动作观察激活的运动程序具有肌肉特异性。这些结果表明，当被试观察与物体相关的动作时，会根据观察到的动作目标激活一个运动程序，当被试表现出效应器-物体相互作用时，该程序会转化为具有肌肉特异性的程序。
