ERP adaptation provides direct evidence for early mirror neuron activation in the inferior parietal lobule

Mirror neuron systems are frequently investigated by assessing overlapping brain activity during observation and execution of actions; however, distinct neuronal subpopulations may be activated that fall below the spatial resolution of magnetic resonance techniques. This shortfall can be resolved using repetition suppression paradigms that identify physiological adaptation processes caused by repeated activation of identical neuronal circuits. Here, event-related potentials were used to investigate the time course of mirror neuron circuit activation using repetition suppression within and across action observation and action execution modalities. In a lip-reading and speech production paradigm, the N170 component indexed stimulus repetition by adapting to both cross-modal and intra-modal repetitions in the left hemisphere. Neuronal source localization revealed activation of the left inferior parietal lobule during cross-modal relative to intra-modal trials. These results provide support for the position that the same neuronal circuits are activated in perceiving and performing articulatory actions. Moreover, our data strongly suggest that inferior parietal lobule mirror neurons are activated relatively early in time, which indicates partly automatic processes of linguistic perception and mirroring. Repetition suppression paradigms therefore help to elucidate neuronal correlates of different cognitive processes and may serve as a starting point for advanced electrophysiological research on mirror neurons.