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Automatic motor cortex activation for natural as compared to awkward grips of a manipulable object

Petit, Leila ; Pegna, Alan ; Harris, Irina ; Michel, Christoph

In: Experimental Brain Research, 2006, vol. 168, no. 1-2, p. 120-130

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    Titre
    • Automatic motor cortex activation for natural as compared to awkward grips of a manipulable object
    Auteur
    • Petit, Leila. Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science, Macquarie University, NSW 2109, Sydney, Australia
    • Pegna, Alan. Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience, School of Psychology, University of Wales, Bangor, UK
    • Harris, Irina. Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science, Macquarie University, NSW 2109, Sydney, Australia
    • Michel, Christoph. Functional Brain Mapping Laboratory, Neurology Clinic, University Hospital and Department of Basic Neuroscience, University Medical School, 1211, Geneva, Switzerland
    Type de document
    • Postprint
    Langue
    • Anglais
    Publié dans
    • Experimental Brain Research, 2006, vol. 168, no. 1-2, p. 120-130. Springer-Verlag
    Autre version électronique
    Identifiant OAI-PMH
    • oai:doc.rero.ch:310483
    Summary
    It has been suggested that, relative to natural objects, man-made object representations in the brain are more specifically defined by functional properties that reflect how an object is used and/or what it is used for (Warrington and Shallice 1984). We recorded 123-channel event-related potentials (ERP) in healthy participants during a mental rotation task involving a manipulable (hammer) and a non-manipulable (church) object. Both stimuli had standard and mirror-image versions rotated in four different orientations, resulting for the manipulable object in some natural and some awkward grips. Using spatial cluster analysis, time periods were determined during which the ERP maps differed between stimulus conditions. Specific maps appeared for natural versus awkward grips with the manipulable object at a very early stage (60-116ms) as well as during a later stage (180-280ms). Source estimations derived from the topographic data indicated that during the second time window the left motor cortex was significantly activated in the case of natural grips. We argue that the motor programs that are semantically associated with the object are automatically activated when it is presented in graspable orientations