On the relation between motor imagery and visual imagery

1994 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 212-213 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roberta L. Klatzky
Keyword(s):  
Motor Imagery ◽  
Visual Imagery ◽  
Motor Preparation ◽  
Functional Equivalence ◽  
Neurological Findings ◽  
Target Article ◽  
Spatial Environment

Jeannerod's target article describes support, through empirical and neurological findings, for the intriguing idea of motor imagery, a form of representation hypothesized to have levels of functional equivalence with motor preparation, while being consciously accessible. Jeannerod suggests that the subjectively accessible content of motor imagery allows it to be distinguished from motor preparation, which is unconscious. Motor imagery is distinguished from visual imagery in terms of content. Motor images are kinesthetic in nature; they are parametrized by variables such as force and time and they are potentially governed by kinematic rules. Jeannerod acknowledges, however, that motor and visual imagery may not easily be separated, because actions take place in a spatial environment. I agree; in fact, I suggest here that visualization may generally be concomitant with, and may even subjectively dominate, motor imagery.

Motor Preparation and Motor Imagery: Functional Equivalence is not Computational Equivalence

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Toovey ◽  
Ellen Seiss ◽  
Annette Sterr
Keyword(s):  
Motor Imagery ◽  
Predictive Coding ◽  
Motor Preparation ◽  
Functional Equivalence ◽  
Costs And Benefits ◽  
Qualitative Aspect ◽  
Imagery Condition ◽  
Subsequent Performance ◽  
System Experiment ◽  
Action Preparation

Vividly imagining action is thought to be functionally equivalent with preparing to act. Although evidence has shown that imagination can prime subsequent action, this is also the defining feature of action preparation. Curiously, neither theory nor experiment have thus far examined to what extent functional equivalence between these phenomena also constitutes a computational equivalence. To test this hypothesis, a response precuing experiment was designed whereby real responses were primed either with relevant imagination or preparation of an action. The information content and validity of precues were manipulated, allowing us to evaluate the relative costly, beneficial, and total congruency effects of these two conditions on subsequent performance. In four experiments, we observed consistency between conditions in their effects on the patterns of response time costs and benefits, demonstrating empirical evidence in line with the functional equivalence hypothesis. Additionally, the strength of priming, measured as the total congruency effect, was consistently larger in the imagery condition. This observation was not dependent on temporal uncertainty (Experiment 2), was a general feature of the motor system (Experiment 3), and could not be explained as a function of cognitive load (Experiment 4). To our knowledge this is the first evidence of a reliable difference between motor imagery and motor preparation, and therefore provides a novel qualitative aspect to the functional equivalence hypothesis. The implications for existing and future theories and models of motor imagery are discussed, with particular focus on the potential value of predictive coding frameworks.

scholarly journals EXPRESS: Embodied Mental Imagery Improves Memory

2021 ◽  
pp. 174702182110092
Author(s):  
Quentin Marre ◽  
Nathalie Huet ◽  
Elodie Labeye
Keyword(s):  
Motor Imagery ◽  
Mental Imagery ◽  
Visual Imagery ◽  
First Person ◽  
Person Perspective ◽  
Memory Efficiency ◽  
Third Person ◽  
First Person Perspective ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Emotional Systems

According to embodied cognition theory, cognitive processes are grounded in sensory, motor and emotional systems. This theory supports the idea that language comprehension and access to memory are based on sensorimotor mental simulations, which does indeed explain experimental results for visual imagery. These results show that word memorization is improved when the individual actively simulates the visual characteristics of the object to be learned. Very few studies, however, have investigated the effectiveness of more embodied mental simulations, that is, simulating both the sensory and motor aspects of the object (i.e., motor imagery) from a first-person perspective. The recall performances of 83 adults were analysed in four different conditions: mental rehearsal, visual imagery, third-person motor imagery, and first-person motor imagery. Results revealed a memory efficiency gradient running from low-embodiment strategies (i.e., involving poor perceptual and/or motor simulation) to high-embodiment strategies (i.e., rich simulation in the sensory and motor systems involved in interactions with the object). However, the benefit of engaging in motor imagery, as opposed to purely visual imagery, was only observed when participants adopted the first-person perspective. Surprisingly, visual and motor imagery vividness seemed to play a negligible role in this effect of the sensorimotor grounding of mental imagery on memory efficiency.

scholarly journals Target-oriented motor imagery for grasping action: different characteristics of brain activation between kinesthetic and visual imagery

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Woo Hyung Lee ◽  
Eunkyung Kim ◽  
Han Gil Seo ◽  
Byung-Mo Oh ◽  
Hyung Seok Nam ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Motor Imagery ◽  
Visual Imagery ◽  
Brain Activation ◽  
Different Characteristics

The representing brain: Neural correlates of motor intention and imagery

1994 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 187-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Jeannerod
Keyword(s):  
Motor Imagery ◽  
Object Oriented ◽  
Action Planning ◽  
Motor Preparation ◽  
Neural Pathways ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Motor Intention ◽  
Posterior Parietal ◽  
Motor Actions ◽  
Motor Representations

AbstractThis paper concerns how motor actions are neurally represented and coded. Action planning and motor preparation can be studied using a specific type of representational activity, motor imagery. A close functional equivalence between motor imagery and motor preparation is suggested by the positive effects of imagining movements on motor learning, the similarity between the neural structures involved, and the similar physiological correlates observed in both imaging and preparing. The content of motor representations can be inferred from motor images at a macroscopic level, based on global aspects of the action (the duration and amount of effort involved) and the motor rules and constraints which predict the spatial path and kinematics of movements. A more microscopic neural account calls for a representation of object-oriented action. Object attributes are processed in different neural pathways depending on the kind of task the subject is performing. During object-oriented action, a pragmatic representation is activated in which object affordances are transformed into specific motor schemas (independently of other tasks such as object recognition). Animal as well as human clinical data implicate the posterior parietal and premotor cortical areas in schema instantiation. A mechanism is proposed that is able to encode the desired goal of the action and is applicable to different levels of representational organization.

Testing the Distinctiveness of Visual Imagery and Motor Imagery in a Reach Paradigm

2009 ◽  
Vol 119 (3) ◽  
pp. 353-365 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carl Gabbard ◽  
Diala Ammar ◽  
Alberto Cordova
Keyword(s):  
Motor Imagery ◽  
Visual Imagery

Perspective-taking in blindness: electrophysiological evidence of altered action representations

2013 ◽  
Vol 109 (2) ◽  
pp. 405-414 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luís Aureliano Imbiriba ◽  
Maitê Mello Russo ◽  
Laura Alice Santos de Oliveira ◽  
Ana Paula Fontana ◽  
Erika de Carvalho Rodrigues ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Motor Imagery ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Motor Preparation ◽  
Middle Finger ◽  
Mental Simulation ◽  
Movement Imagery ◽  
Similar Motor ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Action Representations

It is well established that the mental simulation of actions involves visual and/or somatomotor representations of those imagined actions. To investigate whether the total absence of vision affects the brain activity associated with the retrieval of motor representations, we recorded the readiness potential (RP), a marker of motor preparation preceding the execution, as well as the motor imagery of the right middle-finger extension in the first-person (1P; imagining oneself performing the movement) and in the third-person (3P; imagining the experimenter performing the movement) modes in 19 sighted and 10 congenitally blind subjects. Our main result was found for the single RP slope values at the Cz channel (likely corresponding to the supplementary motor area). No difference in RP slope was found between 1P and 3P in the sighted group, suggesting that similar motor preparation networks are recruited to simulate our own and other people's actions in spite of explicit instructions to perform the task in 1P or 3P. Conversely, reduced RP slopes in 3P compared with 1P found in the blind group indicated that they might have used an alternative, nonmotor strategy to perform the task in 3P. Moreover, movement imagery ability, assessed both by means of mental chronometry and a modified version of the Movement Imagery Questionnaire-Revised, indicated that blind and sighted individuals had similar motor imagery performance. Taken together, these results suggest that complete visual loss early in life modifies the brain networks that associate with others' action representations.

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