Graduate School of Health Sciences, Graduate School of Kansai University of Health Sciences, 2-11-1, Wakaba, Kumatori, Sennan, Osaka, 590-0482, Japan.
Exp Brain Res. 2020 Sep;238(9):2077-2086. doi: 10.1007/s00221-020-05870-3. Epub 2020 Jul 9.
Action observation (AO) and motor imagery (MI) are potential methods to improve various motor functions. AO and MI facilitate corticospinal excitability. Additionally, the combination of AO and MI (AO + MI) facilitates greater corticospinal excitability than AO alone. However, it is unclear whether AO + MI facilitates the excitability of spinal motor neurons better than AO alone. Thus, in this study, we compared the excitability of spinal motor neurons between AO + MI and AO conditions using F-waves. We recruited healthy adult volunteers (n = 31) for F-wave analysis. We recorded F-waves during relaxation to determine the baseline level (Rest), followed by measurement during AO and AO + MI. To counterbalance the order effect, 15 participants performed AO first, while the others performed AO + MI first. F-wave persistence was significantly increased during AO and AO + MI compared to Rest. The F-wave/M-wave amplitude ratio was significantly increased during AO + MI compared to Rest. The present results suggest that the combination of AO and MI facilitates the excitability of spinal motor neurons compared to Rest, whereas AO alone does not.
动作观察（AO）和运动想象（MI）是改善各种运动功能的潜在方法。AO 和 MI 促进皮质脊髓兴奋性。此外，AO 和 MI 的结合（AO+MI）比单独的 AO 更能促进皮质脊髓兴奋性。然而，目前尚不清楚 AO+MI 是否比单独的 AO 更能促进脊髓运动神经元的兴奋性。因此，在这项研究中，我们使用 F 波比较了 AO+MI 和 AO 条件下脊髓运动神经元的兴奋性。我们招募了健康的成年志愿者（n=31）进行 F 波分析。我们在放松期间记录 F 波以确定基线水平（休息），然后在 AO 和 AO+MI 期间进行测量。为了平衡顺序效应，15 名参与者首先进行 AO，而其他参与者首先进行 AO+MI。与休息相比，AO 和 AO+MI 期间 F 波持续时间明显增加。与休息相比，AO+MI 期间 F 波/M 波幅度比明显增加。本研究结果表明，与休息相比，AO 和 MI 的结合比单独的 AO 更能促进脊髓运动神经元的兴奋性。
