CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 193Action Observation and SynchronizationChild and Animal Learning DevelopmentMotor Control and Adaptation

Programmed to learn? The ontogeny of mirror neurons

Open access
Giudice, Marco Del, Manera, Valeria, Keysers, Christian·2009·Developmental Science
DOI 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2008.00783.x
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

Mirror neurons are increasingly recognized as a crucial substrate for many developmental processes, including imitation and social learning. Although there has been considerable progress in describing their function and localization in the primate and adult human brain, we still know little about their ontogeny. The idea that mirror neurons result from Hebbian learning while the child observes/hears his/her own actions has received remarkable empirical support in recent years. Here we add a new element to this proposal, by suggesting that the infant's perceptual‐motor system is optimized to provide the brain with the correct input for Hebbian learning, thus facilitating the association between the perception of actions and their corresponding motor programs. We review evidence that infants (1) have a marked visual preference for hands, (2) show cyclic movement patterns with a frequency that could be in the optimal range for enhanced Hebbian learning, and (3) show synchronized theta EEG (also known to favour synaptic Hebbian learning) in mirror cortical areas during self‐observation of grasping. These conditions, taken together, would allow mirror neurons for manual actions to develop quickly and reliably through experiential canalization. Our hypothesis provides a plausible pathway for the emergence of mirror neurons that integrates learning with genetic pre‐programming, suggesting new avenues for research on the link between synaptic processes and behaviour in ontogeny.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2008.00783.x

Cites

9 of 9 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • There is no evidence that the tendency of infants to look at their own hands evolved to promote the development of MNs or action understanding rather than visuomotor control.

    “there is no evidence that the tendency of infants to look at their own hands evolved to promote the development of MNs or action understanding rather than visuomotor control”

    From Mirror neurons: from origin to function (2014) · cites this paper as Del Giudice et al., 2009

    The Conclusions (page unavailable) say infants’ attention to their own moving hands may have evolved primarily to support visuomotor control, rather than for the adaptive value of a mirror system. But the paper presents this as a tentative evolutionary account compatible with different scenarios; it does not establish the claim’s categorical statement that there is no evidence for the alternative. (LLM, conf=0.82)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 38

  1. Adolph, K., & Berger, S. (2005). Physical and motor development. In M. Bornstein & M. Lamb (Eds.), Developmental science: an advanced textbook (pp. 223 -281). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
  2. Amano, S., & Kezuka, E. (1994). Infants' orientation to adults' hand and the development of object performance. The Journal of Kagawa Nutrition University, 25, 135 -148.
  3. Anisfeld, M. (1991). Neonatal imitation: Review. Developmental Review, 11, 60 -97.
  4. Arbib, M.A. (2004). How far is language beyond our grasp? A response to Hurford. In D.K. Oller & U. Griebel (Eds.), Evolution of communication systems: A comparative approach (pp. 315-322). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  5. Bi, G., & Poo, M. (2001). Synaptic modification by correlated activity: Hebb's postulate revisited. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 24, 139 -166.
  6. Corner, M.A., van Pelt, J., Wolters, P.S., Baker, R.E., & Nuytinck, R.H. (2002). Physiological effects of sustained blockade of excitatory synaptic transmission on sopntaneous active developing neuronal networks -an inquiry into the reciprocal linkage between intrinsic biorythms and neuro- plasticity in early ontogeny. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 26, 127-185.
  7. Ferrari, P.F., Gallese, V., Rizzolatti, G., & Fogassi, L. (2003). Mirror neurons responding to the observation of ingestive and communicative mouth actions in the monkey ventral premotor cortex. European Journal of Neuroscience, 17, 1703-1714.
  8. Flatt, T. (2005). The evolutionary genetics of canalization. Quarterly Review of Biology, 80, 287-316.
  9. Gergely, G., & Watson, J. (1999). Early socio-emotional development: contingency perception and the social- biofeedback model. In P. Rochat (Ed.), Early socialization (pp. 101-136). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
  10. Greenwald, A.G. (1970). Sensory feedback mechanisms in performance control: with special reference to the ideo-motor mechanism. Psychological Review, 77, 73 -99.
  11. Haslinger, B., Erhard, P., Altenmüller, E., Schroeder, U., Boecker, H., & Ceballos-Baumann, A.O. (2005). Transmodal sensorimotor networks during action observation in professional pianists. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 17, 282-293.
  12. In D.K. Oller & U. Griebel (Eds.), Evolution of communication systems (pp. 297-313). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  13. Johnson, M.H., & Morton, J. (1991). Biology and cognitive development: the case of face recognition. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
  14. Lahav, A., Saltzman, E., & Schlaug, G. (2007). Action repre- sentation of sound: audiomotor recognition network while listening to newly acquired actions. Journal of Neuroscience, 27, 308-314.
  15. Maratos, O. (1982). Trends in the development of imitation in early infancy. In T.G. Bever (Ed.), Regressions in mental development: Basic phenomena and theories (pp. 81-101). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
  16. Meltzoff, A.N. (2005). Imitation and other minds: the 'Like Me' hypothesis. In S. Hurley & N. Chater (Eds.), Perspectives on imitation: From neuroscience to social science, vol. 2 (pp. 55-77). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  17. Meltzoff, A.N., & Decety, J. (2003). What imitation tells us about social cognition: a reapproachement between develop- mental psychology and cognitive neuroscience. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 358, 491- 500.
  18. Myowa-Yamakoshi, M. (2001). Evolutionary foundation and development in imitation. In T. Matsuzawa (Ed.), Primate origins of human cognition and behavior (pp. 349-367). Tokyo: Springer-Verlag.
  19. Orekhova, E.V., Stroganova, T.A., & Posikera, I.N. (1999). Theta synchronization during sustained anticipatory atten- tion in infants over the second half of the first year of life. Internationsl Journal of Psychophysiology, 32, 151-172.
  20. Paillard, J. (1990). Basic neurophysiological structures of eye-hand coordination. In C. Bard, M. Fleury, & L. Ray (Eds.) Development of eye-hand coordination across the life span (pp. 26-74). Columbia, SC: South Carolina University Press.
  21. Prinz, W. (2002). Experimental approaches to imitation. In A.N. Meltzoff & W. Prinz (Eds.), The imitative mind: Development, evolution, and brain bases (pp. 143 -163). Cam- bridge: Cambridge University Press.
  22. In A.N. Meltzoff & W. Prinz (Eds.), The imitative mind: Development, evolution, and brain bases (pp. 247-266). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  23. Robertson, S.S. (1989). Mechanism and function of cyclic spontaneous movement. In W.P. Smotherman & S.R. Robinson (Eds.), Behaviour of the fetus (pp. 77-94).
  24. Robertson, S.S. (1990). Temporal organization in fetal and newborn movement. In H. Bloch & B.I. Bertenthal (Eds.), Sensory-motor organization and development in infancy and early childhood (pp. 105-122). Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
  25. Robertson, S.S., & Bacher, L.F. (1995). Oscillation and chaos in fetal motor activity. In J.P. Lecanuet, W.P. Fifer, N.A. Krasnegor, & W.P. Smotherman (Eds.), Fetal development. A psychobiological perspective (pp. 169-189). Oxford: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
  26. Schmalhausen, I.I. (1949). Factors of evolution: The theory of stabilizing selection. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
  27. Seager, M.A. Johnson, L.D., Chabot, E.S., Asaka, Y., & Berry, S.D. (2002). Oscillatory brain states and learning: impact of hippocampal theta-contingent training. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 99, 1616 -1620.
  28. Smotherman, W., Robinson, S.R., & Robertson, S.S. (1988). Cyclic motor activity in fetal rat (rattus norvegicus). Journal of Comparative Psychology, 102, 78 -82.
  29. Sommerville, J.A., & Woodward, A.L. (in press). The link between action production and action processing in infancy.
  30. In F. Grammont, D. Legrand, & P. Livet (Eds.), Naturalizing intention in action. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  31. Stroganova, T.A., Orekhova, E.V., & Posikera, I.N. (1998). Externally and internally controlled attention in infants: an EEG study. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 30, 339-351.
  32. Suzue, T., & Shinoda, Y. (1999). Highly reproducible spatiotem- poral patterns of mammalian embryonic movements at the developmental stage of the earliest spontaneous motility. European Journal of Neuroscience, 11, 2697-2710.
  33. Tarabulsy, G., Tessier, R., & Kappas, A. (1996). Contingency detection and the contingent organization of behaviour in interactions: implications for socioemotional development in infancy. Psychological Bulletin, 120, 25 -41.
  34. In N. Granott & J. Parziale (Eds.), Microdevelopment (pp. 59-79). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  35. van Der Meer, A. (1997). Keeping the arm in the limelight: advanced visual control of arm movements in neonates. European Journal of Pediatric Neurology, 4, 103 -108.
  36. West-Eberhard, M.J. (2003). Developmental plasticity and evolution. New York: Cambridge University Press.
  37. Woodward, A.L. (2005). The infant origins of intentional understanding. In R.V. Kail (Ed.), Advances in Child Develop- ment and Behaviour (pp. 229-262). Oxford: Elsevier.
  38. Woodward, A., Somerville, J.A., & Guajardo, J.J. (2001). How infants make sense of intentional action. In B. Malle, L. Moses, & D. Baldwin (Eds.), Intentions and intentionality: Foundations of social ognition (pp. 149-169). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Giudice, M. D., Manera, V., & Keysers, C.
Affiliations
  • University of Turin (IT)
  • University of Groningen (NL)
Corresponding author
Giudice, Marco Del
ORCID
Venue
Developmental Science
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2009-01-12
Volume
12
Issue
2
Pages
350-363
ISSN
  • 1363-755X (ISSN-L)
  • 1467-7687
DOI
10.1111/j.1467-7687.2008.00783.x
OpenAlex
W1975393967
Cited by
193
References
9
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 7 · 2020: 6 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 12 · 2017: 10 · 2016: 13 · 2015: 18 · 2014: 19 · 2013: 16 · 2012: 22
FWCI
18.73
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor (vor)
Locations
  • Developmental Science (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Institutional Research Information System University of Turin (University of Turin) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
  • ArTS Archivio della ricerca di Trieste (University of Trieste https://www.units.it/) (submittedVersion)
  • University of Groningen research database (University of Groningen / Centre for Information Technology) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • European Commission
  • Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Action Observation and Synchronization
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Motor Control and Adaptation
Keywords
mirror neurons, ontogeny, infant development, Hebbian learning, imitation, social learning, handedness, synaptic learning
MeSH terms
Hand, Humans, Imitative Behavior, Infant, Learning, Models, Neurological, Neurons, Psychomotor Performance, Theta Rhythm, Visual Perception, Self-Examination

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review