The Queensland Brain Institute, The University of Queensland, St Lucia 4072, Australia.
The Queensland Brain Institute, The University of Queensland, St Lucia 4072, Australia.
Neuropsychologia. 2018 Mar;111:241-251. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2018.01.037. Epub 2018 Jan 31.
Perception and action are inextricably linked, down to the level of single cells which have both visual and motor response properties - dubbed 'mirror neurons'. The mirror neuron system is generally associated with direct-matching or resonance between observed and executed actions (and goals). Yet in everyday interactions responding to another's movements with matching actions (or goals) is not always appropriate. Here we examine processes associated with intentionally not imitating, as separable from merely detecting an observed action as mismatching one's own. Using fMRI, we test how matched and mismatched stimulus-response mapping for actions is modulated depending on task-relevance. Participants were either cued to intentionally copy or oppose a presented action (intentional imitation or counter-imitation), or cued to perform a predefined action regardless of the presented action (incidental imitation or counter-imitation). We found distinct cortical networks underlying imitation compared to counter-imitation, involving areas typically associated with an action observation network and widespread occipital activation. Intentionally counter-imitating particularly involved frontal-parietal networks, including the insula and cingulate cortices. This task-dependent recruitment of frontal networks for the intentional selection of opposing responses supports previous evidence for the preparatory suppression of imitative responses. Sensorimotor mirroring is modulated via control processes, which complex human interactions often require.
感知和行动是不可分割的，甚至在单细胞水平上也是如此，这些细胞既有视觉反应特性，也有运动反应特性——被称为“镜像神经元”。镜像神经元系统通常与观察到的和执行的动作（和目标）之间的直接匹配或共振有关。然而，在日常互动中，对他人动作的反应并不总是与匹配的动作（或目标）相适应。在这里，我们研究了与故意不模仿相关的过程，这些过程与仅仅检测到与自己的动作不匹配的观察到的动作是可以区分开来的。我们使用 fMRI 测试了动作的匹配和不匹配的刺激-反应映射是如何根据任务相关性而被调节的。参与者被提示有意复制或反对呈现的动作（有意模仿或反模仿），或者被提示执行预先定义的动作，而不管呈现的动作如何（偶然模仿或反模仿）。我们发现，与反模仿相比，模仿有不同的皮层网络，涉及到通常与动作观察网络相关的区域和广泛的枕叶激活。故意反模仿特别涉及到额顶网络，包括脑岛和扣带回皮质。这种针对对立反应的有意选择的额网络的任务依赖性招募，支持了之前关于模仿反应的预备性抑制的证据。感觉运动镜像通过控制过程进行调节，而复杂的人类互动通常需要这些过程。
