Neuro-MI, Milan Center for Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Milano - Bicocca, Milan, Italy.
Sci Rep. 2019 Jan 30;9(1):1000. doi: 10.1038/s41598-018-37876-x.
Previous evidence has shown neuroplastic changes in brain anatomy and connectivity associated with the acquisition of professional visuomotor skills. Reduced hemispherical asymmetry was found in the sensorimotor and visual areas in expert musicians and athletes compared with non-experts. Moreover, increased expertise with faces, body, and objects resulted in an enhanced engagement of the occipito-temporal cortex (OTC) during stimulus observation. The present study aimed at investigating whether intense and extended practice with dance would result in an enhanced symmetric response of OTC at an early stage of action processing. Expert ballet dancers and non-dancer controls were presented with videos depicting ballet steps during EEG recording. The observation of the moving dancer elicited a posterior N2 component, being larger over the left hemisphere in dancers than controls. The source reconstruction (swLORETA) of the negativity showed the engagement of the bilateral inferior and middle temporal regions in experts, while right-lateralized activity was found in controls. The dancers also showed an early P2 and enhanced P300 responses, indicating faster stimulus processing and subsequent recognition. This evidence seemed to suggest expertise-related increased sensitivity of the OTC in encoding body kinematics. Thus, we speculated that long-term whole-body practice would result in enriched and refined action processing.
先前的证据表明，与专业视动技能习得相关的脑解剖结构和连接存在神经可塑性变化。与非专业人士相比，专业音乐家和运动员在感觉运动和视觉区域的半球不对称性降低。此外，随着对面孔、身体和物体的专业知识的增加，在刺激观察过程中，枕颞皮质（OTC）的参与度增加。本研究旨在调查与舞蹈相关的高强度和长时间练习是否会导致在动作处理的早期阶段 OTC 的对称反应增强。专家芭蕾舞演员和非舞蹈对照组在 EEG 记录期间观看了描绘芭蕾舞步的视频。观察移动的舞者会引起后部 N2 成分，在舞者中比对照组更偏向左侧半球。负性的源重建（swLORETA）显示专家的双侧颞中、下区参与，而对照组则发现右侧活动。舞者还表现出较早的 P2 和增强的 P300 反应，表明刺激处理更快，随后的识别能力增强。这一证据似乎表明，OTC 在编码身体运动学方面的敏感性与专业知识有关。因此，我们推测长期的全身练习会导致更丰富和更精细的动作处理。
