Bottom‐up, not top‐down, modulation of imitation by human and robotic models
Abstract
Visual observation of human actions provokes more motor activation than observation of robotic actions. We investigated the extent to which this visuomotor priming effect is mediated by bottom‐up or top‐down processing. The bottom‐up hypothesis suggests that robotic movements are less effective in activating the ‘mirror system’ via pathways from visual areas via the superior temporal sulcus to parietal and premotor cortices. The top‐down hypothesis postulates that beliefs about the animacy of a movement stimulus modulate mirror system activity via descending pathways from areas such as the temporal pole and prefrontal cortex. In an automatic imitation task, subjects performed a prespecified movement (e.g. hand opening) on presentation of a human or robotic hand making a compatible (opening) or incompatible (closing) movement. The speed of responding on compatible trials, compared with incompatible trials, indexed visuomotor priming. In the first experiment, robotic stimuli were constructed by adding a metal and wire ‘wrist’ to a human hand. Questionnaire data indicated that subjects believed these movements to be less animate than those of the human stimuli but the visuomotor priming effects of the human and robotic stimuli did not differ. In the second experiment, when the robotic stimuli were more angular and symmetrical than the human stimuli, human movements elicited more visuomotor priming than the robotic movements. However, the subjects' beliefs about the animacy of the stimuli did not affect their performance. These results suggest that bottom‐up processing is primarily responsible for the visuomotor priming advantage of human stimuli.
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Presenting the nature of the task-irrelevant hand at the wrist only, such as human versus robotic hands, has been found to not alter the automatic imitation effect.
“presenting the nature of the task-irrelevant hand at the wrist only, such as in a study showing human versus robotic hands, has been found to not alter the automatic imitation effect11”
From Event-related potentials of automatic imitation are modulated by ethnicity during stimulus processing, but not during motor execution (2018) · cites this paper as [11]
Automatic imitation has been shown to be modulated by social context cues.
“Automatic imitation has been shown to be modulated by social context cues (see e.g.3–11)”
From Event-related potentials of automatic imitation are modulated by ethnicity during stimulus processing, but not during motor execution (2018) · cites this paper as [11]
A study investigating automatic imitation of human versus robotic hands showed the nature of the hand only at the wrist.
“This is in line with a study investigating automatic imitation of human versus robotic hands, also showing the nature of the hand only at the wrist11.”
From Event-related potentials of automatic imitation are modulated by ethnicity during stimulus processing, but not during motor execution (2018) · cites this paper as [11]
Manipulating the wrists of humans and robots did not modulate the behavioral response.
“Similar to our study, manipulating the wrists of humans and robots did not modulate the behavioral response.”
From Event-related potentials of automatic imitation are modulated by ethnicity during stimulus processing, but not during motor execution (2018) · cites this paper as [11]
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- Authors
- Press, C., Gillmeister, H., & Heyes, C.
- Affiliations
- University College London (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Press, Clare
- Venue
- European Journal of Neuroscience
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2006-10
- Volume
- 24
- Issue
- 8
- Pages
- 2415-2419
- ISSN
- 0953-816X (ISSN-L)
- 1460-9568
- OpenAlex
- W604545442
- Cited by
- 90
- References
- 23
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 10 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 1 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 3 · 2015: 5 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 11 · 2012: 4
- FWCI
- 5.52
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- European Journal of Neuroscience (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- Open Access at Essex (University of Essex) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Directorate for Biological Sciences
- Economic and Social Research Council (RES-538-28-1001)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Action Observation and Synchronization
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Social Robot Interaction and HRI
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Motor Control and Adaptation
- Keywords
- imitation, mirror system, bottom-up processing, top-down processing, human movement, automatic imitation, superior temporal sulcus
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Cues, Female, Hand, Humans, Male, Movement, Nerve Net, Photic Stimulation, Psychomotor Performance, Robotics, Set, Psychology
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