Undergraduate students predicted what would be made visible by a planar mirror. A paper-and-pencil task confirmed previous findings that when approaching a mirror from the side, participants expected to see their reflection in the mirror earlier than they actually would. This early response was found for all mirrors when the observer moved horizontally--even when the mirror was placed on the fl...

Mirror neuron system (MNS) represents one of the most important discoveries in the area of neuropsychology of past decades. More than 500 papers have been published in this area (PubMed), and the major functions of MNS include action understanding, imitation, empathy, all of which are critical for an individual to be social. Recent studies suggested that MNS can modulate emotion states possibly...

OBJECTIVE To investigate the effect of hand action observation training, i.e., mirror neuron system (MNS) based training, on language function of aphasic patients after stroke. In addition, to reveal the tentative mechanism underlying this effect. METHODS Six aphasic patients after stroke, meeting the criteria, undergo 3 weeks' training protocol (30 min per day, 6 days per week). Among them, ...

[Purpose] This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of mirror therapy combined with a conventional rehabilitation program on upper extremity motor and functional recovery in stroke patients. [Subjects and Methods] Thirty-one hemiplegic patients were included. The patients were randomly assigned to a mirror (n=16) or conventional group (n=15). The patients in both groups underwent conventio...

Learning novel skills involves reorganization and optimization of cognitive processing involving a broad network of brain regions. Previous work has shown asymmetric costs of switching to a well-trained task vs. a poorly-trained task, but the neural basis of these differential switch costs is unclear. The current study examined the neural signature of task switching in the context of acquisitio...

We investigated people's perception and knowledge of planar mirror reflections. People were accurate at deciding when they could first see their reflection as they approached a mirror from the side, but only if their reflection was visible. Most people stopped too early if the mirror was covered up. People also overestimated the size of the reflection of their face on the surface of a mirror if...

BACKGROUND Evidence of reliable smooth visual pursuit is crucial for both diagnosis and prognosis in prolonged disorders of consciousness (PDOC). However, a mirror is more likely than an object to elicit evidence of smooth pursuit. Our objective was to identify the physiological and/or cognitive mechanism underlying the mirror benefit. METHODS We recorded eye-movements while healthy participa...

abstracttask-based language teaching is considered an effective way to achieve a harmony between grammar and communication. the present study investigates two different ways of teaching modal verbs: task-based versus traditional approaches. to this purpose, an oxford placement test was administered to select 40 homogeneous participants out of a larger population who took this test. the selected...