Watch and Learn: Athletes Can Improve by Observing the Actions of Others

Locomotor adaptation is modulated by observing the actions of others.

Observing the motor actions of another person could facilitate compensatory motor behavior in the passive observer. Here we explored whether action observation alone can induce automatic locomotor adaptation in humans. To explore this possibility, we used the "broken escalator" paradigm. Conventionally this involves stepping upon a stationary sled after having previously experienced it actually...

Human neural responses elicited to observing the actions of others.

Monkey electrophysiological and human neuroimaging studies indicate the existence of specialized neural systems for the perception and execution of actions. To date, the dynamics of these neural systems in humans have not been well studied. Here, we investigated the spatial and temporal behavior of human neural responses elicited to viewing motion of the face, hand, and body. Scalp event-relate...

Social cognition and schizophrenia: Observing others’ actions, rewards and errors

Look and Learn: Extracting Information from Actions of Others

Dynamics pertaining to learning from the actions of others are modeled with focus on a running example, showing how we may come to conclusions regarding an ontic fact solely by observing others act on their beliefs regarding the fact in question. The tools used are elements from dynamic epistemic logic, with the addition of decision and interpretation rules, allowing local, rule-based choice an...

Training the Motor Cortex by Observing the Actions of Others During Immobilization

Limb immobilization and nonuse are well-known causes of corticomotor depression. While physical training can drive the recovery from nonuse-dependent corticomotor effects, it remains unclear if it is possible to gain access to motor cortex in alternative ways, such as through motor imagery (MI) or action observation (AO). Transcranial magnetic stimulation was used to study the excitability of t...