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The macarena dance shows that imitation is not as immediate as you'd think and are sometimes required numerous choreographic attended training sessions to achieve some coordination and, If possible, so famous grace in movement of arms and hips. is possible that during a party some of the attendees to do the macarena dance have preferred to wander about the neural networks that enable one to follow a choreography or not. For example, one could question If watching the choreography from the comfort of an armchair would activate the same neurons that those who if they were dancing. This would not be a trivial question considering the recent developments and debates in neuroscience about the role played by mirror neurons in social cognition in general and the understanding of the actions of others, in particular. Mirror neurons were first described in monkeys and outstanding about them is that "lit up" not only when a monkey carried out an action (such as grasping a cup), but also when the monkey watched another doing the same action. Then other studies have suggested the existence of a similar system in humans. These neurons, with the ability to reflect the actions observed and enforced, are in the parietal cortex and premotor cortex . Given its apparent involvement in several aspects of social cognition, have been called also "sympathetic neurons" and has even been proposed that are "the force behind the great leap forward in human evolution" . But before we get excited again it is still necessary to understand several aspects regarding its origin and how they work. According Cecilia Heyes, University of Oxford, the first thing you need to know is where do mirror neurons? . According to a review published this year, the mirror neuron system could be 1) an adaptation to the understanding of the action on others or 2) a byproduct of associative learning. In the first case, mirror neurons have been favored by natural selection because they helped to holders of them to understand what others were doing. In the second case, mirror neurons would be a product of the learning that Pavlov studied with his famous dogs. According to Cecilia, both explanations are plausible, although the hypothesis of associative learning has more advantages. For example, associative learning in mind the differences between monkeys and humans could be explained more easily. |
In support of associative theory these and other studies suggest that sensorimotor experience can improve, reverse or eliminate the activation of mirror neurons. |
The fun about mirror neurons is just beginning. But p or the time, what is certain is that mirror neurons do not, by themselves, to empathy. Empathy is a complex phenomenon that involves more than a network of neurons on and off. Still, the mirror neuron system seems to be a key element in social cognition and the study will certainly help us to understand issues related to it. |
Stephanie Nettles is a kind of Carrie Bradshaw of psychology and cognitive science. Stephanie also lives and works in New York, but not in Manhattan, and also interested in relationships and dating. However, Stephanie does not conform to talk to their friends about these issues: Stephanie invites volunteers to his lab to help answer the questionnaires, conducting experiments and even take magnetic resonance imaging of their brains for them. The conclusions reached Stephanie not published in The New York Star, as Carrie. Stephanie publishes its findings on the passionate love, friendship, self-awareness, as well as intentions, desires and actions of people, among other topics, in journals in psychology and neuroscience. In fact, recently published, together with some colleagues, an article on the understanding of motor intention between couples in love in the journal Journal of Social and Personal Relationship s . Stephanie Nettles and colleagues Nisa Patel, Francesco Bianchi-Demicheli and Scott T. Grafton wanted to deepen the understanding intent between couples in love passionately and its relation to embodied cognition (or Embodied cognition). That is, wanted to know more about love is that couples are able to understand the intention and predict the actions of their half, and how this relates to the way they integrate their experiences. |
The first part of the New York team's experiment consisted of placing advertisements in which couples are asked "passionate love" and dyads of friends. Once the curious and / or enthusiastic volunteers arrived, the next task was to distinguish volunteers who actually were "passionate love" for those who just experienced a "love of company" ( companionate love) . The latter refers to one that can happen between best friends, where there is affection and commitment, but where there is not necessarily sexual arousal. Diada passionately in love. Author unknown.
is interesting to note that even though close friends dyads corresponding reaction times were similar to those passionate dyads, suggesting that it is precisely the loving relationship which facilitates understanding observed actions and not just the proximity. The authors attribute the results to the existence of implicit facilitation (implicit priming ): couples in love passionately quickly understand the intention under certain stimuli. That is, the reaction occurs at an associative level, not only perceptual.
has been suggested as a kind of self-expansion (or expansion of self) occurs when we experience intense emotions (such as passionate love) and then we create a mental representation shared self and partner. Moreover, since the same brain areas appear to mediate the love and embodied cognition Stephanie and her team support the idea that passionate love could mediate embodied cognition.
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