BIROn - Birkbeck Institutional Research Online

    Stimulus-driven selection of routes to imitation

    Press, Clare and Heyes, C. (2008) Stimulus-driven selection of routes to imitation. Experimental Brain Research 188 (1), pp. 147-152. ISSN 0014-4819.

    Full text not available from this repository.

    Abstract

    Several models have proposed that an action can be imitated via one of two routes: a direct visuospatial route, which can in principle mediate imitation of both meaningful (MF) and meaningless (ML) actions, and an indirect semantic route, which can be used only for MF actions. The present study investigated whether selection between the direct and indirect routes is strategic or stimulus driven. Tessari and Rumiati (J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform 30:1107–1116, 2004) have previously shown, using accuracy measures, that imitation of MF actions is superior to imitation of ML actions when the two action types are presented in separate blocks, and that the advantage of MF over ML items is smaller or absent when they are presented in mixed blocks. We first replicated this finding using an automated reaction time (RT), as well as accuracy, measure. We then examined imitation of MF and ML actions in the mixed condition as a function of the action type presented in the previous trial and in relation to the number of previous test trials. These analyses showed that (1) for both action types, performance was worse immediately after ML than MF trials, and (2) even at the beginning of the mixed condition, responding to MF actions was no better than responding to ML items. These results suggest that the properties of the action stimulus play a substantial role in determining whether imitation is mediated by the direct or the indirect route, and that effects of block composition on imitation need not be generated through strategic switching between routes.

    Metadata

    Item Type: Article
    Keyword(s) / Subject(s): Imitation, Semantics, Working memory, Two-route model, Associative sequence learning
    School: Birkbeck Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Science > School of Psychological Sciences
    Research Centres and Institutes: Brain and Cognitive Development, Centre for (CBCD)
    Depositing User: Administrator
    Date Deposited: 05 Nov 2012 09:28
    Last Modified: 02 Aug 2023 16:59
    URI: https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/5555

    Statistics

    Activity Overview
    6 month trend
    0Downloads
    6 month trend
    695Hits

    Additional statistics are available via IRStats2.

    Archive Staff Only (login required)

    Edit/View Item Edit/View Item