The Representation of Actions in the Human Brain
The ability to understand other people’s actions is a fundamental basis for social interactions. According to a dominant view in the literature, this ability critically relies on the recruitment of parietal and frontal regions that are also involved when we plan and perform actions ourselves. Here I will present a number of recent studies using multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA) and representational similarity analysis (RSA) of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and magnetoencephalography (MEG) data to identify action representations that generalize across action properties that are irrelevant for action understanding. I will discuss the results, which highlight the importance of the lateral occipitotemporal cortex for such abstract representations, in light of the ongoing debate on the neural basis of action understanding, and point out future research directions.
Date:
12 April 2016, 13:00 (Tuesday, -1st week, Trinity 2016)
Venue:
Tinbergen Building, South Parks Road OX1 3PS
Venue Details:
C113 Weiskrantz
Speaker:
Dr Angelika Lingnau (Royal Holloway, University of London)
Organising department:
Department of Experimental Psychology
Booking required?:
Not required
Audience:
Members of the University only
Editor:
Janice Young
