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Neural correlates of action perception at the onset of functional grasping

Marta Bakker1, Moritz M Daum2, Andrea Handl3

  • 1Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, van Kraemers alle 1, SE- 751 42 Uppsala, Sweden, Research Group "Infant Cognition and Action", Max Planck Institute or Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Stephanstraße 1a, D-04103 Leipzig, Germany, and Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Binzmühlestrasse 14, Box 21, CH-8050 Zürich, Switzerland marta.bakker@psyk.uu.se.

Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
|September 7, 2014
PubMed

Insights

Infants

Area of Science:

  • Developmental psychology
  • Cognitive neuroscience
  • Infant perception

Background:

  • Infant motor development is crucial for understanding action perception.
  • The action-perception link is a key area in developmental research.
  • Early infant grasping abilities are foundational for cognitive development.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate how infants perceive grasping actions.
  • To determine the age at which infants link observed actions with their own motor abilities.
  • To explore the neural basis of action-perception in early development.

Main Methods:

  • Recording event-related potentials (ERPs) in infants (4-6 months).
  • Presenting congruent and incongruent grasping actions (power and precision grasps).
  • Analyzing the P400 component of ERPs in response to observed actions.

Main Results:

  • The P400 component distinguished congruent from incongruent power grasps in 6-month-olds.
  • This effect was also observed in 5-month-olds capable of power grasps.
  • No similar effect was found for precision grasps, which infants cannot perform.
  • Infants' neural responses are specific to actions they can execute.

Conclusions:

  • Infants' perception of grasping actions is tied to their own motor capabilities.
  • The action-perception link is specialized for performable actions.
  • Early cognitive development involves a sophisticated mapping of observed actions onto motor schemas.

Keywords:
P400event-related potentialexperiencegraspinginfant

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