Intelligible speakers achieve specific vocal tract constrictions in rapid sequence. These constrictions are associated in theory with speech motor goals. Adult-focused models of speech production assume that discrete phonological representations, sequenced into word-length plans for output, define these goals. This assumption introduces a serial order problem for speech. It is also at odds with children's speech. In particular, child phonology and timing control suggest holistic speech plans, and so the hypothesis of whole word production. This hypothesis solves the serial (...) order problem by avoiding it. When the same solution is applied to adult speech the problem becomes how to explain the development of highly intelligible speech. This is the problem addressed here. A modeling approach is used to demonstrate how perceptual-motor units of production emerge over developmental time with the perceptual-motor integration of holistic speech plans that are also phonological representations; the specific argument is that perceptual-motor units are a product of trajectories (nearly) crossing in motor space. The model, which focuses on the integration process, defines the perceptual-motor map as a set of linked pairs of experienced perceptual and motor trajectories. The trajectories are time-based excursions through speaker-defined perceptual and motor spaces. By hypothesis, junctures appear where motor trajectories near or overlap one another in motor space when the shared (or extremely similar) articulatory configurations in these regions are exploited to combine perceptually-linked motor paths along different trajectories. Junctures form in clusters in motor space. These clusters, along with their corresponding (linked) perceptual points, represent perceptual-motor units of production, albeit at the level of speech motor control only. The units serve as pivots in motor space during speaking; they are points of transition from one motor trajectory to another along perceptually-linked paths that are selected to produce best approximations of whole word targets. (shrink)

It is unclear whether the decline in executive function and perceptual-motor function found in older adults with mild cognitive impairment is the result of a normal aging process or due to MCI. This study aimed to determine age-related and MCI-related cognitive impairments of the EF and PMF. The EF and PMF were investigated across four groups of 240 participants, 60 in each group, including early adult, middle adult, older adult, and older adult with probable MCI. The EF, working memory, (...) inhibition, and cognitive flexibility were evaluated using digit span backward tasks, the Stroop color-word test, and the modified switching verbal fluency test, respectively. The PMF, visual perception, visuoconstructional reasoning, and perceptual-motor coordination were evaluated using the clock reading test, stick design test, and stick catching test, respectively. Group differences were found for all subdomains of EF and PMF, except for perceptual-motor coordination, indicating that this subdomain could be maintained in older adults and was not affected by MCI. For the age difference, working memory, cognitive flexibility, visual perception, and visuoconstructional reasoning remained stable across middle adults and started to decline in older adults, while cognitive inhibition began to decrease in middle adults and it further declined in older adults. To control the confounding effect of education level, the results showed that only cognitive flexibility was further decreased in older adults with probable MCI compared to those without MCI. In conclusion, cognitive inhibition decreased earlier in middle adults, whereas EF and PMF started to decline in older adults. Cognitive flexibility was the only MCI-sensitive cognitive function. (shrink)

The control of action has traditionally been described as "automatic". In particular, movement control may occur without conscious awareness, in contrast to normal visual perception. Studies on rapid visuomotor adjustment of reaching movements following a target shift have played a large part in introducing such distinctions. We suggest that previous studies of the relation between motor performance and perceptual awareness have confounded two separate dissociations. These are: (a) the distinction between motoric and perceptual representations, and (b) an orthogonal distinction (...) between conscious and unconscious processes. To articulate these differences more clearly, we propose a new measure of motor awareness, based on subjects' ability to reproduce the spatial details of reaching movements they have just made. Here we focus on the dissociation between motor awareness and perceptual awareness that may occur when subjects make rapid visuomotor adjustments to reaching movements following a target shift. In experiment 1, motor awareness was dissociated from perceptual awareness of a target shift during reaching movement. Participants' reproduction of movement endpoints following visuomotor adjustment was independent of whether they saw the target shift or not. Experiment 2 replicated this result, and further showed that neither motor awareness nor motor performance were disrupted by TMS over the parietal cortex. The neural mechanisms underlying motor awareness, and the implications for theories of consciousness, are discussed. (shrink)

The recent upsurge in “brain-training and perceptual-cognitive-training", proposing to improve isolated processes such as brain function, visual perception and decision-making, has created significant interest in elite sports practitioners, seeking to create an ‘edge’ for athletes. The claims of these related 'performance-enhancing industries' can be considered together as part of a process training approach proposing enhanced cognitive and perceptual skills and brain capacity, to support performance in everyday life activities, including sport. For example, the 'process-training industry' promotes the idea that (...) playing games not only makes you a better player, but also smarter, more alert, and a faster learner. In this position paper we critically evaluate the effectiveness of both types of process-training programmes in generalizing transfer to sport performance. These issues are addressed in three stages. First, we evaluate empirical evidence in support of perceptual-cognitive process training, and its application to enhancing sport performance. Second, we critically review putative modularised mechanisms underpinning this kind of training, addressing limitations and subsequent problems. Specifically, we consider merits of this highly specific form of training, which focuses on training of isolated processes such as cognitive processes (attention, memory, thinking) and visual perception processes, separately from performance behaviors and actions. We conclude that these approaches may, at best, may provide some 'general transfer' of underlying processes to specific sport environments, but lack 'specificity of transfer' to contextualize actual performance behaviors. A major weakness of process training methods is their focus on enhancing performance in body “modules” (e.g., eye, brain, memory, anticipatory sub-systems). What is lacking is evidence on how these isolated components are modified and subsequently interact with other process “modules”, which are considered to underlie sport performance. Finally, we propose how an ecological dynamics approach, aligned with an embodied framework of cognition undermines the rationale that modularised processes can enhance performance in competitive sport. An ecological dynamics perspective proposes that the body is a complex adaptive system, interacting with performance environments in a functionally integrated manner, emphasising that the inter-relation between motor processes, cognitive and perceptual functions and the constraints of a sport task is best understood at the performer-environment scale of analysis. (shrink)

The spatial-temporal association indicates that time is represented spatially along a left-to-right line. It is unclear whether the spatial-temporal association is mainly related to a perceptual or a motor component. In addition, the spatial-temporal association is not consistently found using a time reproduction task. Our rationale for this finding is that, classically, a non-lateralized button for performing the task has been used. Using two lateralized response buttons, the aim of the study was to find a spatial-temporal association in a (...) time reproduction task. To account for the perceptual component, reference and target stimuli were presented in different spaces through four experiments. In all experiments, a Spatial-Temporal Association of Response Codes (STEARC) effect was found and this effect was not modulated by the spatial position of both reference and target stimuli. The results suggested that the spatial-temporal association was mainly derived from the spatial information provided by response buttons, reflecting a motor but not visuospatial influence. (shrink)

This two-volume set provides a comprehensive overview of the multidisciplinary field of Embodied Cognition. With contributions from internationally acknowledged researchers from a variety of fields, _Foundations of Embodied Cognition_ reveals how intelligent behaviour emerges from the interplay between brain, body and environment. Covering early research and emerging trends in embodied cognition, Volume 1 _Perceptual and Emotional Embodiment_ is divided into four distinct parts, bringing together a number of influential perspectives and new ideas. Part one opens the volume with an overview (...) of theoretical perspectives and the neural basis of embodiment, before part two considers body representation and its links with action. Part three examines how actions constrain perception of the environment, and part four explores how emotions can be shaped and structured by the body and its activity. Building on the idea that knowledge acquisition, retention and retrieval are intimately interconnected with sensory and motor processes, _Foundations of Embodied Cognition_ is a landmark publication in the field. It will be of great interest to researchers and advanced students from across the cognitive sciences, including those specialising in psychology, neuroscience, intelligent systems and robotics, philosophy, linguistics and anthropology. (shrink)

Predictive Processing (PP) is an increasingly influential neurocognitive-computational framework. PP research has so far focused predominantly on lower level perceptual, motor, and various psychological phenomena. But PP seems to face a “scale-up challenge”: How can it be extended to conceptual thought, language, and other higher cognitive competencies? Compositionality, arguably a central feature of conceptual thought, cannot easily be accounted for in PP because it is not couched in terms of classical symbol processing. I argue, using the example of language, (...) that there is no strong reason to think that PP cannot be scaled up to higher cognition. I suggest that the tacitly assumed common-sense conception of language as Generative Grammar (“folk linguistics”) and its notion of composition leads to the scale-up concerns. Fodor’s Language of Thought Hypothesis (LOTH) plays the role of a cognitive computational paradigm for folk linguistics. Therefore, we do not take LOTH as facing problems with higher cognition, at least with regard to compositionality. But PP can plausibly play the role of a cognitive-computational paradigm for an alternative conception of language, namely Construction Grammar. If Construction Grammar is a plausible alternative to folk linguistics, then PP is not in a worse position than LOTH. (shrink)

First, I note three questions that need further exploration: how fast the emulator operates, compared to the real-time events it models; what exactly perceptual emulation, with no motor component, consists of; and whether images are equivalent to raw sensations. Next, I propose that Grush's framework can explain the role of motor activation in processing “imitable” stimuli.

Learning in intelligent systems is a result of direct or indirect interaction with the environment. Humans can learn by way of different states of (inter-)action such as the execution or the imagery of an action, but their unique potential to induce brain-related as well as mind-related changes in the motor action system is still being debated. The systematic repetition of different states of action (e.g., execution and imagery in terms of physical and mental practice) and their contribution to the (...) learning of complex motor actions has traditionally been approached by way of performance improvements. More recently, approaches highlighting the role of action representation in the learning of complex motor actions have evolved. In the present perspective paper, we build on brain-related findings and sketch recent research on learning by way of imagery and execution from a hierarchical, perceptual-cognitive approach to the motor action system. These findings provide valuable insights into the learning of intelligent systems from a perceptual-cognitive, representation-based perspective and as such add to our current understanding of action representation in memory and its changes with practice. Future research should build bridges between approaches in order to more thoroughly understand functional changes throughout the learning process, and to jointly contribute to developing intelligent cognitive systems and their application in robotics, rehabilitation, or sports. (shrink)

As an explicit organizing metaphor, memory aid, and conceptual framework, the prefrontal cortex may be viewed as a five-member ‘Executive Committee,’ as the prefrontal-control extensions of five sub-and-posterior-cortical systems: the ‘Perceiver’ is the frontal extension of the ventral perceptual stream which represents the world and self in object coordinates; the ‘Verbalizer’ is the frontal extension of the language stream which represents the world and self in language coordinates; the ‘Motivator’ is the frontal cortical extension of a subcortical extended-amygdala stream which (...) represents the world and self in motivational/emotional coordinates; the ‘Attender’ is the frontal cortical extension of a subcortical extended-hippocampal stream which represents the world and self in spatiotemporal coordinates and directs attention to internal and external events; and the ‘Coordinator’ is the frontal extension of the dorsal perceptual stream which represents the world and self in body- and eye-coordinates and controls willed action and working memory. This tutorial review examines the interacting roles of these five systems in perception, working memory, attention, long - term memory, motor control, and thinking. (shrink)

The Action-sentence Compatibility Effect is often taken as supporting the fundamental role of the motor system in understanding sentences that describe actions. This effect would be related to an internal “simulation,” i.e., the reactivation of past perceptual and motor experiences. However, it is not easy to establish whether this simulation predominantly involves spatial imagery or motor anticipation. In the classical ACE experiments, where a real motor response is required, the direction and motor representations are mixed. (...) In order to disentangle spatial and motor aspects involved in the ACE, we performed six experiments in different conditions, where the motor component was always reduced, asking participants to judge the sensibility of sentences by moving a mouse, thus requiring a purely spatial representation, compatible with nonmotor interpretations. In addition, our experiments had the purpose of taking into account the possible confusion of effects of practice and of compatibility. Also, in contrast to the usual paradigm, we included no-transfer filler sentences in the analysis. The ACE was not found in any experiment, a result that failed to support the idea that the ACE could be related to a simulation where spatial aspects rather than motor ones prevail. Strong practice effects were always found and were carved out from results. A surprising effect was that no-transfer sentences were processed much slower than others, perhaps revealing a sort of participants’ awareness of the structure of stimuli, i.e., their finding that some of them involved motion and others did not. The relevance of these outcomes for the embodiment theory is discussed. (shrink)

Philosophers and neuroscientists often suggest that we perceptually represent objects and their properties. However, they start from very different background assumptions when they use the term “perceptual representation”. On the one hand, sometimes philosophers do not need to properly take into consideration the empirical evidence concerning the neural states subserving the representational perceptual processes they are talking about. On the other hand, neuroscientists do not rely on a meticulous definition of “perceptual representation” when they talk about this empirical evidence (...) that is supposed to show that we perceptually represent such and such properties. It seems that, on both sides, something is missed. My aim is to show that, in the light of empirical evidence from neuroscience, the case of action properties is a good candidate in order to properly talk of perceptually represented properties. My claim is that the neurophysiological states encoding action properties are perceptual processes and that these perceptual processes are representational processes. That is, in the case of those neurophysiological states involved in the detection of action properties, it is correct to speak of perceptual representational states, and hence, ipso facto, of perceptually represented properties. First, I describe a reasonable and widely agreed upon conception of perceptual representation in the philosophical literature. Then, I report evidence from vision and motor neuroscience concerning the perception of action properties, which is subserved by the ventro-dorsal stream, a portion of the dorsal visual system. Finally, I show that a strong connection can be found between the philosophical idea of perceptual representation I have reported before and the neuroscientific evidence concerning the activity of the ventro-dorsal stream, whose job is, as said, to detect action properties. (shrink)

It is well known that common objects in the environment can evoke possibilities of action, but what about their bi-dimensional representation? Do pictures or paintings that represent action-related objects evoke the same possibilities of actions of the objects that they represent? In contemporary cognitive science, there are two contrasting views on this issue. On the one hand, the ecological-dispositional approach to perception supports the idea that viewing depicted objects as endowed with the potential for action is nothing but an illusion. (...) On the other hand, recent findings show that our motor system is activated by the perception of both real and depicted action-related objects, and this activation plays a functional role in planning motor acts. A broad analysis reveals that the activation of the motor system during perceptual tasks plays a crucial rule in processing the practical meaning of the concrete objects and of the abstract representations of them. This evidence has consequences to our understanding of the way we experience pictures and paintings. (shrink)

The confluence of creativity in music performance finds itself in performance practices and cultural motifs, the communication of the human body along with the instrument it interacts with, and individual performers’ perceptual, motor, and cognitive abilities that contribute to varied musical interpretations of the same piece or melodic line. The musical and artistic execution of a player, as well as the product of this phenomena can become determinant causes in a creative mental state. With advances in neurocognitive measures, the (...) state of one’s artistic intuition and execution has been a growing interest in understanding the creative thought process of human behavior, particularly in improvising artists. This article discusses the implementation on the concurrence of spontaneous (Type-1) and controlled (Type-2) processing modes that may be apparent in the perception of non-improvising artists on how melodic lines are perceived in music performance. Elucidating the cortical-subcortical activity in the dual-process model may extend to non-improvising musicians explored in the paradigm of neural correlates. These interactions may open new possibilities for expanding the repertoire of executive functions, creativity, and the coordinated activity of cortical-subcortical regions that regulate the free flow of artistic ideas and expressive spontaneity in future neuromusical research. (shrink)

Latash & Anson's intention to describe only the regularities of motor behavior is compromised by the homunculus paradigm. Although we concur on the need to redefine in atypical populations, we contend that this enterprise requires a process based functionalism. We argue for accommodating movement control and perceptual processes with physical and task constraints in a natural setting.

Spontaneous eye blinks are modulated around perceptual events. Our previous study, using a visual ambiguous stimulus, indicated that blink probability decreases before a reported perceptual switch. In the current study, we tested our hypothesis that an absence of blinks marks a time in which perceptual switches are facilitated in‐ and outside the visual domain. In three experiments, presenting either a visual motion quartet in light or darkness or a bistable auditory streaming stimulus, we found a co‐occurrence of blink rate reduction (...) with increased perceptual switch probability. In the visual domain, perceptual switches induced by a short interruption of visual input (blank) allowed an estimate of the timing of the perceptual event with respect to the motor response. This provided the first evidence that the blink reduction was not a consequence of the perceptual switch. Importantly, by showing that the time between switches and the previous blink was significantly longer than the inter‐blink interval, our studies allowed to conclude that perceptual switches did not happen at random but followed a prolonged period of nonblinking. Correspondingly, blink rate and switch rate showed an inverse relationship. Our study supports the idea that the absence or presence of blinks maps perceptual processes independent of the sensory modality. (shrink)

What we perceive is the product of an intrinsic process and not part of external physical reality. This notion is consistent with the philosophical position of transcendental idealism but also agrees with physiological findings on the thalamocortical system. -Frequency rhythms of discharge activity from thalamic and cortical neurons are facilitated by cholinergic arousal and resonate in thalamocortical networks, thereby transiently forming assemblies of coherent oscillations under constraints of sensory input and prefrontal attentional mechanisms. Perception and conscious experience may be based (...) on such assemblies and sensory input to thalamic nuclei plays merely a constraining role in their formation. In schizophrenia, the ability of sensory input to modulate self-organisation of thalamocortical activity may be generally reduced. If during arousal thalamocortical self-organisation is underconstrained by sensory input, then attentional mechanisms alone may determine the content of perception and hallucinations may arise. (shrink)

People categorize objects slowly when visual input is highly impoverished instead of optimal. While bottom-up models may explain a decision with optimal input, perceptual hypothesis testing (PHT) theories implicate top-down processes with impoverished input. Brain mechanisms and the time course of PHT are largely unknown. This event-related potential study used a neuroimaging paradigm that implicated prefrontal cortex in top-down modulation of occipitotemporal cortex. Subjects categorized more impoverished and less impoverished real and pseudo objects. PHT theories predict larger impoverishment effects (...) for real than pseudo objects because top-down processes modulate knowledge only for real objects, but different PHT variants predict different timing. Consistent with parietal-prefrontal PHT variants, around 250 ms, the earliest impoverished real object interaction started on an N3 complex, which reflects interactive cortical activity for object cognition. N3 impoverishment effects localized to both prefrontal and occipitotemporal cortex for real objects only. The N3 also showed knowledge effects by 230 ms that localized to occipitotemporal cortex. Later effects reflected (a) word meaning in temporal cortex during the N400, (b) internal evaluation of prior decision and memory processes and secondary higher-order memory involving anterotemporal parts of a default mode network during posterior positivity (P600), and (c) response related activity in posterior cingulate during an anterior slow wave (SW) after 700 ms. Finally, response activity in supplementary motor area during a posterior SW after 900 ms showed impoverishment effects that correlated with RTs. Convergent evidence from studies of vision, memory, and mental imagery which reflects purely top-down inputs, indicates that the N3 reflects the critical top-down processes of PHT. A hybrid multiple-state interactive, PHT and decision theory best explains the visual constancy of object cognition. (shrink)

In sensorimotor integration, representation involves an anticipatory model of the action to be performed. This model integrates efferent signals (motor commands), its reafferent consequences (sensory consequences of an organism’s own motor action), and other afferences (sensory signals) originated by stimuli independent of the action performed. Representation, a form of internal modeling, is invoked to explain the fact that behavior oriented to the achievement of future goals is relatively independent from the immediate environment. Internal modeling explains how a cognitive (...) system achieves its goals despite variations in the environment with insufficient and noisy sensory–perceptual data. In a self that acts intentionally on the environment, knowledge is dependent upon the necessity to guide actions directed toward an aim. The self-inner model, a representation of internal and external environments (including reafferent and afferent messages) and also of the behavior plans and desirable future states (aims) and efferent intentions (motor planning and motor command messages), is intrinsically linked to a thinking capacity, which is supposed to emerge from the binding of multiple influences. Thinking emerges when higher behavior strategies are considered possible and capable of leading to aims or the fulfillment of intentions. In this model, symbolization processes are projective and anticipatory and, in this way, beyond present referents. Symbolization occurs linked to action planning, command, and regulation in mental simulation. Meaning is related to an inner sense of a self that acts over the environment. (shrink)

The model presented in the target article includes feature processing and higher representations. I argue, based on neuropsychological evidence, that spatial representations are also involved in perceptual awareness of somatosensory events. Second, there is an asymmetry, with a right-hemisphere–based bilateral representation of the body. Third, the specific aspect of bodily awareness concerning motor function monitoring involves a network that includes the premotor cortex.

Sometimes, after years of painstaking work, someone presents a startling argument that seems to suddenly snatch the ground right out from under your feet. And it's back to square one. Such a conceptual trapdoor caught me by surprise a few years ago. For decades, I had been convinced it is simply inconceivable that subjectivity -- the interior experience of how consciousness feels -- could possibly emerge from a previously wholly objective world, that mind could evolve from ‘dead’ matter. It seemed (...) to me that the arguments of materialist philosophers, cognitive scientists and neuroscientists invariably missed the point. They always began with an assumption of ontological objectivity or physicality, and proceeded to show that that must be the source of consciousness. Well, of course, it had to be -- given their starting assumption. But what they were talking about wasn't consciousness at all. It was usually either some neural correlation, some computer analogue, or some complex and abstract linguistic deconstruction. Whatever their approach, the first-person experience of consciousness -- it's subjective feel -- always slipped through their grasp. They were looking at the problem from the third-person perspective -- from objectivity. And you can't get to here from there. (shrink)

As shown by neuroscientific evidence, neglect may occur without elementary sensorimotor impairments. The deficit is to be found at a higher, more abstract level of representation, which prevents the patient not only from seeing, but from conceiving the contralesional space. By analysing a series of neuropsychological results, in this paper we suggest a crucial role of time for the construction of a world: on this basis, we try to explain how it is possible that half the ontology gets lost. The (...) analysis of the ontological implication of neglect will allow us to shed light on manifestations of the pathology apparently disconnected. (shrink)

A widely shared assumption in the literature about skilled motor behavior is that any action that is not blindly automatic and mechanical must be the product of computational processes upon mental representations. To counter this assumption, in this paper we offer a radical embodied (non-representational) account of skilled action that combines ecological psychology and the Deweyan theory of habits. According to our proposal, skilful performance can be understood as composed of sequences of mutually coherent, task-specific perceptual-motor habits. (...) Such habits play a crucial role in simplifying both our exploration of the perceptual environment and our decision-making. However, we argue that what keeps habits situated, precluding them from becoming rote and automatic, are not mental representations but the agent's conscious attention to the affordances of the environment. It is because the agent is not acting on autopilot but constantly searching for new information for affordances that she can control her behavior, adapting previously learned habits to the current circumstances. We defend that our account provides the resources needed to understand how skilled action can be intelligent (flexible, adaptive, context-sensitive) without having any representational cognitive processes built into them. (shrink)

Analyzed F. Galton's data on the sensory, psychomotor, and physical attributes of 1,639 females and 4,849 males. The reliability of the measures, developmental trends in mean scores, correlations of the measures with age, correlations among measures, occupational differences in scores, and sibling correlations are described. Developmental trends during later childhood, adolescence, and early maturity are compared to those described in contemporary developmental psychological literature.

Psychologists have traditionally approached phenomenology by describing perceptual states, typically in the context of vision. The control of actions has often been described as 'automatic', and therefore lacking any specific phenomenology worth studying. This article will begin by reviewing some historical attempts to investigate the phenomenology of action. This review leads to the conclusion that, while movement of the body itself need not produce a vivid conscious experience, the neural process of voluntary action as a whole has distinctive phenomenological consequences. (...) The remainder of the article tries to characterise this phenomenology. First, the planning of actions is often conscious, and can produce a characteristic executive mode of awareness. Second, our awareness of action often arises from the process of matching what we intended to do with what actually happened. Failures of this matching process lead to particularly vivid conscious experience, which we call 'error awareness'. These features of action phenomenology can be directly related to established models of motor control. This allows an important connection between phenomenology and neuroscience of action. Third, whereas perceptual phenomenology is normally seen as caused or driven by the sensory stimulus, a much more fluid model is required for phenomenology of action. Several experimental results suggest that phenomenology of action is partly a post hoc reconstruction, while others suggest that our awareness of action represents an integration of several processes at multiple levels of motor processing. Fourth, and finally, studies of the phenomenology of action, unlike those of perception, show a strong linkage between primary awareness and secondary awareness or self-consciousness: awareness of action is specifically and inextricably awareness of my action. We argue that the concepts of agency and of proprioaction are fundamental to this linkage. For these reasons, action represents a much more promising field than perception for attacking the problematic question of the relation between primary and secondary consciousness. Some promising directions for future research are indicated. (shrink)

Psychologists have traditionally approached phenomenology by describing perceptual states, typically in the context of vision. The control of actions has often been described as 'automatic', and therefore lacking any specific phenomenology worth studying. This article will begin by reviewing some historical attempts to investigate the phenomenology of action. This review leads to the conclusion that, while movement of the body itself need not produce a vivid conscious experience, the neural process of voluntary action as a whole has distinctive phenomenological consequences. (...) The remainder of the article tries to characterise this phenomenology. First, the planning of actions is often conscious, and can produce a characteristic executive mode of awareness. Second, our awareness of action often arises from the process of matching what we intended to do with what actually happened. Failures of this matching process lead to particularly vivid conscious experience, which we call 'error awareness'. These features of action phenomenology can be directly related to established models of motor control. This allows an important connection between phenomenology and neuroscience of action. Third, whereas perceptual phenomenology is normally seen as caused or driven by the sensory stimulus, a much more fluid model is required for phenomenology of action. Several experimental results suggest that phenomenology of action is partly a post hoc reconstruction, while others suggest that our awareness of action represents an integration of several processes at multiple levels of motor processing. Fourth, and finally, studies of the phenomenology of action, unlike those of perception, show a strong linkage between primary awareness and secondary awareness or self-consciousness: awareness of action is specifically and inextricably awareness of my action. We argue that the concepts of agency and of proprioaction are fundamental to this linkage. For these reasons, action represents a much more promising field than perception for attacking the problematic question of the relation between primary and secondary consciousness. Some promising directions for future research are indicated. (shrink)

Interest in thought experiments (TEs) derives from the paradox: “How can findings that carry conviction result from a new experiment conducted entirely within the head?” Historical studies have established the importance of TEs in science but have proposed disparate hypotheses concerning the source of knowledge in TEs, ranging from empiricist to rationalist accounts. This article analyzes TEs in think‐aloud protocols of scientifically trained experts to examine more fine‐grained information about their use. Some TEs appear powerful enough to discredit an existing (...) theory—a disconfirmatory purpose. In addition, confirmatory and generative purposes were identified for other TEs. One can also use details in transcript data, including imagery reports and gestures, to provide evidence for a central role played by imagistic simulations in many TEs, and to suggest that these simulations can generate new knowledge using several sources, including the “extended application” of perceptual motor schemas, implicit prior knowledge, and spatial reasoning operations, in contrast to formal arguments. These sources suggest what it means for TEs to be grounded in embodied processes that can begin to explain the paradox above. This leads to a rationalistic view of TEs as using productive internal reasoning, but the view also acknowledges the historical role that experience with the world can play in forming certain schemas used in TEs. Understanding such processes could help provide a foundation for developing a larger model of scientific investigation processes grounded on imagistic simulation (Clement, 2008). (shrink)

When two or more people coordinate their actions in space and time to produce a joint outcome, they perform a joint action. The perceptual, cognitive, and motor processes that enable individuals to coordinate their actions with others have been receiving increasing attention during the last decade, complementing earlier work on shared intentionality and discourse. This chapter reviews current theoretical concepts and empirical findings in order to provide a structured overview of the state of the art in joint action (...) research. We distinguish between planned and emergent coordination. In planned coordination, agents' behavior is driven by representations that specify the desired outcomes of joint action and the agent's own part in achieving these outcomes. In emergent coordination, coordinated behavior occurs due to perception action couplings that make multiple individuals act in similar ways, independently of joint plans. We review evidence for the two types of coordination and discuss potential synergies between them. (shrink)

This article sets up a neurophenomenological approach to understanding cinema spectatorship in order to investigate how embodied engagement with technologies of sound and motion can foster a sense of experiential realism. It takes as a starting point the idea that the empirical study of emotive, perceptual, motor, and cognitive processes involved in film spectatorship is impoverished without a phenomenological account of the lived experience under investigation. Correspondingly, engaging with neuroscientific studies enriches the scope of phenomenological inquiry and offers (...) new insights into the film experience. Analysis of diverse films including Interstellar, Leviathan, San Andreas and The Thin Red Line reveals how technological innovations dating from Hale’s Tours to contemporary D-BOX and Dolby Atmos systems have enhanced the audience’s sense of immersion and corporeal investment in the film experience. Building on the research of Vivian Sobchack and Vittorio Gallese, I argue that aesthetic techniques including the use of low frequency sound effects and wearable cameras facilitate shared affective engagement and a form of embodied simulation associated with kinaesthetic empathy and augmented narrative involvement. (shrink)

Much indirect evidence supports the hypothesis that transformations of mental images are at least in part guided by motor processes, even in the case of images of abstract objects rather than of body parts. For example, rotation may be guided by processes that also prime one to see results of a specific motor action. We directly test the hypothesis by means of a dual-task paradigm in which subjects perform the Cooper-Shepard mental rotation task while executing an (...) unseen motor rotation in a given direction and at a previously learned speed. Four results support the inference that mental rotation relies on motor processes. First, motor rotation that is compatible with mental rotation results in faster times and fewer errors in the imagery task than when the two rotations are incompatible. Second, the angle through which subjects rotate their mental images, and the angle through which they rotate a joystick handle are correlated, but only if the directions of the two rotations are compatible. Third, motor rotation modifies the classical inverted V-shaped mental rotation response time function, favoring the direction of the motor rotation; indeed, in some cases motor rotation even shifts the location of the minimum of this curve in the direction of the motor rotation. Fourth, the preceding effect is sensitive not only to the direction of the motor rotation, but also to the motor speed. A change in the speed of motor rotation can correspondingly slow down or speed up the mental rotation. (shrink)

This article argues for an epistemology of music, stating that dealing with music can be considered as a process of knowledge acquisition. What really matters is not the representation of an ontological musical reality, but the generation of music knowledge as a tool for adaptation to the sonic world. Three major positions are brought together: the epistemological claims of Jean Piaget, the biological methodology of Jakob von Uexküll, and the constructivistic conceptions of Ernst von Glasersfeld, each ingstress the role of (...) the music user rather than the music. Dealing with music, in this view, is not a matter of representation, but a process of semiotization of the sonorous environment as the outcome of interactions with the sound. Hence the role of enactive cognition and perceptual-motor interaction with the sonic environment. What is considered a central issue is the way how listeners as subjects experience their own phenomenal world or Umwelt, and how they can make sense out of their sonic environment. Umwelt-research, therefore, is highly relevant for music education in stressing the role of the listener and his/her listening strategies. (shrink)

An important question about eye-movement behavior is when the decision is made to terminate a fixation and program the following saccade. Different approaches have found converging evidence in favor of a mixed-control account, in which there is some overlap between processing information at fixation and planning the following saccade. We examined one interesting instance of mixed control in visual search: lag-2 revisits, during which observers fixate a stimulus, move to a different stimulus, and then revisit the first stimulus on the (...) next fixation. Results show that the probability of lag-2 revisits occurring increased with the number of target-similar stimuli, and revisits were preceded by a brief fixation on the intervening distractor stimulus. We developed the Efficient Visual Sampling computational model to simulate our findings and to provide insight into mixed control of fixations and the perceptual, cognitive, and motor processes that produce lag-2 revisits. (shrink)

The proposal that language has evolved to conform to general cognitive and learning constraints inherent in the human brain calls for specification of these mechanisms. We propose that just as cognition appears to be grounded in cross-modal perceptual-motor capabilities, so too must language. Evidence for perceptual-motor grounding comes from non-arbitrary sound-to-meaning correspondences and their role in word learning.

To investigate whether people can implicitly learn regularities in a social context, we developed a new implicit sequence learning task combining elements from classic false belief and serial reaction time tasks. Participants learned that protagonists were offered flowers at four locations. The protagonists' beliefs concerning the flowers were true or false, depending on their orientation, respectively, toward the scene or away from it. Unbeknown to the participants, there was a fixed belief-related sequence involving three dimensions. Participants had to indicate as (...) fast as possible where the flowers were located, or how many flowers were given according to the protagonists. Experiment 1 combined perceptual and motor processes, whereas Experiment 2 unconfounded the sequence and motor responses, allowing to investigate pure perceptual implicit learning. For reasons of comparison, two non-social conditions were created in Experiment 2 by replacing the protagonists with two non-social objects—colored cameras or shapes. Results revealed significant implicit sequence learning of all belief-related dimensions in Experiment 1, and of true-false belief orientation in Experiment 2, even without a motor confound. Importantly, there were faster reaction times and stronger sequence learning effects in the social than in the non-social conditions. The present findings demonstrate for the first time that people are able to implicitly learn belief-related sequences. (shrink)

Functional imaging techniques, such as positron emission tomography and functional magnetic resonance imaging, present a unique opportunity to examine, in humans, the cerebral representation of space in vivo. Space is ubiquitous and not a unitary phenomenon, and the brain uses visual, vestibular and proprioceptive inputs to produce multiple representations of space subserving spatial cognition, ranging from gaze control to remembering multiple complex large-scale environments. Functional imaging studies have shown the importance of the parietal cortex in perceptual, motor, attention and (...) working memory aspects of body-centred human spatial cognition. Functional imaging has also revealed pathways in humans homologous to those found in monkeys for the separate processing of spatial location and object identity. There are further suggestions of similar differentiation in working memory. The importance of the medial temporal region in the recall of spatial location has been confirmed also and novel virtual reality paradigms are now providing insights into the cerebral representation of spatially-extended large-scale environments. We still have much to learn about the cerebral representation of space in the human brain and functional brain imaging, in concert with patient studies and animal models, will allow us to continue investigating. (shrink)

We share the authors' general approach to the study of perception and action, but rather than singling out a particular level of “late perceptual” and “early motor” processing for sensorimotor interactions, we argue that these can arise at multiple levels during action preparation and execution. Recent data on action-perception transfer are used to illustrate this perspective.