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Body-part specific interactions of action verb processing with motor behaviour.
Anne Klepp1, Valentina Niccolai1, Jan Sieksmeyer2
1Institute of Clinical Neuroscience and Medical Psychology, Medical Faculty, Heinrich Heine University, Universitätsstr. 1, 40225 Düsseldorf, Germany.
Behavioural Brain Research
|April 9, 2017
Summary
This study shows that understanding action words involves specific body parts. Action language processing is body part specific, with hand and foot actions influencing reaction times differently.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Psycholinguistics
- Motor Control
Background:
- The motor cortex plays a role in understanding action-related language.
- Investigating the link between language and motor systems provides insight into cognitive functions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine the body part specificity of motor system involvement in action verb processing.
- To test for a double dissociation between language and motor control using a priming paradigm.
Main Methods:
- Two experiments used action verb stimuli followed by hand or foot motor responses.
- A priming procedure with semantic decisions (Experiment 2) or ignoring semantics (Experiment 1) was employed.
- Reaction times were measured to assess language-motor facilitation effects.
Main Results:
- Experiment 2 demonstrated a double dissociation: action verbs facilitated responses from the matching body part (hand/foot).
- Experiment 1 showed an interaction between verb-response congruence and verb semantics, without a clear double dissociation.
- The findings confirm body part-specific motor priming effects in action language processing.
Conclusions:
- The motor system is crucial for processing action-related language in a body part-specific manner.
- The double dissociation paradigm effectively reveals the intricate relationship between language comprehension and motor execution.
- Semantic processing of action verbs engages distinct motor representations.