Familiar Actions Research Articles

Effects of physical practice on the duration of motor imagery

Motor Simulation Theory proposes that imagined actions are produced using the brain’s motor system, and should therefore always be temporally equivalent to physical movements. However, empirical results are not always consistent with this prediction. Studies indicate that the durations of unfamiliar imagined actions are over-estimated, whereas the durations of more familiar actions may be closer to (or even faster than) actual movement execution. We therefore examined the effects of different levels of practice on the durations of both physically performed and imagined actions. Participants (N=31) completed an initial assessment in which the durations of physically performed and imagined finger movement sequences were measured. Participants then completed three days of physical training in which different sequences received either extensive training (150 repetitions/session), minimal training (10 repetitions/session), or no training. In a subsequent assessment session, we found that the time taken to both physically execute and imagine performing sequences decreased with training. However, contrary to the predictions of Motor Simulation theory, imagined movement durations consistently over-estimated those of physically performed movements. While the difference in the timing of imagined and physically executed movements decreased between the initial and final assessment, this effect was not modulated by training. These results extend our understanding of the relationship between motor imagery and physical practice, and highlight a key limitation in the predictions of Motor Simulation Theory.

Beyond balance: The role of the Vestibular system in action recognition

BackgroundAction recognition is a fundamental aspect of human interaction. This process is mediated by the activation of shared sensorimotor representations during action execution and observation. Although complex movements involving balance or head and trunk rotations require vestibular signals for effective execution, their role in the recognition of others' actions is still unknown. ObjectiveTo investigate the causal involvement of the vestibular system in the discrimination of actions performed by others and whether this is influenced by motor familiarity. MethodsIn a single-blind design involving 25 healthy participants, Galvanic Vestibular Stimulation (GVS) was administered during an Action Discrimination Task (ADT), in which videos of actions categorized as vestibular/non-vestibular and familiar/unfamiliar were presented. Following each video, participants were required to identify the climax of the previously viewed action between two image options, using a two-alternative forced choice paradigm. The ADT was performed in active and sham GVS conditions, with left or right anodal montages. Response Times (RTs), Accuracy, and subjective motor familiarity were recorded for each action category. ResultsIn sham GVS condition, an overall familiarity effect was observed, where RTs for familiar actions were faster than RTs for unfamiliar ones, regardless of vestibular engagement (p < .001; ηp2 = .80). Conversely, under active GVS, a selective interference of the identification of vestibular familiar actions was observed compared to sham. Specifically, GVS prolonged RTs for recognizing familiar vestibular actions (p = .004, d = .59) while concurrently enhancing visual sensitivity (d’) for the same actions (p = .03, r = .21). ConclusionThese findings demonstrate the contribution of the vestibular system to action recognition. GVS disrupted the sensorimotor representation of vestibular actions and led to increased reliance on an alternative processing system focused on visual analysis of limb positions. This dissociation provides valuable insights for future investigations into the complex relationship between vestibular signals and cognitive processes involved in action identification, essential for developing innovative GVS interventions, particularly for individuals with sensorimotor or vestibular disorders.

Action sequence learning, habits, and automaticity in obsessive-compulsive disorder

This study investigates the goal/habit imbalance theory of compulsion in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), which postulates enhanced habit formation, increased automaticity, and impaired goal/habit arbitration. It directly tests these hypotheses using newly developed behavioral tasks. First, OCD patients and healthy participants were trained daily for a month using a smartphone app to perform chunked action sequences. Despite similar procedural learning and attainment of habitual performance (measured by an objective automaticity criterion) by both groups, OCD patients self-reported higher subjective habitual tendencies via a recently developed questionnaire. Subsequently, in a re-evaluation task assessing choices between established automatic and novel goal-directed actions, both groups were sensitive to re-evaluation based on monetary feedback. However, OCD patients, especially those with higher compulsive symptoms and habitual tendencies, showed a clear preference for trained/habitual sequences when choices were based on physical effort, possibly due to their higher attributed intrinsic value. These patients also used the habit-training app more extensively and reported symptom relief post-study. The tendency to attribute higher intrinsic value to familiar actions may be a potential mechanism leading to compulsions and an important addition to the goal/habit imbalance hypothesis in OCD. We also highlight the potential of smartphone app training as a habit reversal therapeutic tool.

Action sequence learning, habits, and automaticity in obsessive-compulsive disorder

This study investigates the goal/habit imbalance theory of compulsion in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), which postulates enhanced habit formation, increased automaticity, and impaired goal/habit arbitration. It directly tests these hypotheses using newly developed behavioral tasks. First, OCD patients and healthy participants were trained daily for a month using a smartphone app to perform chunked action sequences. Despite similar procedural learning and attainment of habitual performance (measured by an objective automaticity criterion) by both groups, OCD patients self-reported higher subjective habitual tendencies via a recently developed questionnaire. Subsequently, in a re-evaluation task assessing choices between established automatic and novel goal-directed actions, both groups were sensitive to re-evaluation based on monetary feedback. However, OCD patients, especially those with higher compulsive symptoms and habitual tendencies, showed a clear preference for trained/habitual sequences when choices were based on physical effort, possibly due to their higher attributed intrinsic value. These patients also used the habit-training app more extensively and reported symptom relief post-study. The tendency to attribute higher intrinsic value to familiar actions may be a potential mechanism leading to compulsions and an important addition to the goal/habit imbalance hypothesis in OCD. We also highlight the potential of smartphone app training as a habit reversal therapeutic tool.

Children's suggestibility for neutral arbitrary actions in the context of norm violations.

This study investigated children's false memories for neutral arbitrary actions. Five- to six-year-olds (N = 32) were taught four arbitrary actions, each following specific rules. The children then watched a televised adult performing eight actions: the four familiar actions while violating one aspect of each rule script and four unfamiliar actions. Suggestive and non-suggestive questions about all witnessed actions were asked, followed by forced-choice test questions to measure the false memory effect. The likelihood of forming false memories was higher in the suggestive condition than in the non-suggestive condition. There was no effect of previously acquired knowledge about the rules of the actions and no interaction between rule knowledge and suggestion. The results are discussed in light of previous findings in related fields of false memory research.

Orcas remember whatto copy: a deferred and interference-resistant imitation study.

Response facilitation has often been portrayed as a "low level" category of social learning, because the demonstrator's action, which is already in the observer's repertoire, automatically triggers that same action, rather than induces the learning of a new action. One way to rule out response facilitation consists of introducing a delay between the demonstrator's behavior and the observer's response to let their possible effects wear off. However, this may not rule out "delayed response facilitation" in which the subject could be continuously "mentally rehearsing" the demonstrated actions during the waiting period. We used a do-as-the-other-did paradigm in two orcas to study whether they displayed cognitive control regarding their production of familiar actions by (1) introducing a delay ranging from 60 to 150s between observing and producing the actions and (2) interspersing distractor (non-target) actions performed by the demonstrator and by the subjects during the delay period. These two manipulations were aimed at preventing the mental rehearsal of the observed actions during the delay period. Both orcas copied the model's target actions on command after various delay periods, and crucially, despite the presence of distractor actions. These findings suggest that orcas are capable of selectively retrieving a representation of an observed action to generate a delayed matching response. Moreover, these results lend further support to the proposal that the subjects' performance relied not only on a mental representation of the specific actions that were requested to copy, but also flexibly on the abstract and domain general rule requested by the specific "copy command". Our findings strengthen the view that orcas and other cetaceans are capable of flexible and controlled social learning.

Speaker performance on sports performance -Behavior analysis using OpenPose

Most of the sound quality evaluation methods for loudspeaker are based on physical evaluation and subjective evaluation. In the physical evaluation, we focus on the peak sound pressure and the rise speed. In the subjective evaluation, the sound quality is evaluated by the subjective evaluation experiment using the sound quality evaluation word. However, it's difficult for people who don't have professional knowledge in the field of acoustics to judge the performance of a loudspeaker from these evaluation methods. In addition, according to the engineers of a speaker manufacturer, the difference of the sound quality of the loudspeaker may affect the movement and motivation of the game. In this study, aims to evaluate the sound quality of loudspeaker objectively from a new point of view. In order to clarify whether the difference of the sound quality of the loudspeaker affects the movement, the movement analysis using OpenPose was carried out. As a result, it was found that the complicated motion was not likely to be affected by the difference of the sound quality of the loudspeaker. However, the results suggested that simple and familiar actions may be affected by the difference in loudspeaker sound quality.

Neural correlates of familiar and unfamiliar action in infancy

Behavioral evidence shows that experience with an action shapes action perception. Neural mirroring has been suggested as a mechanism underlying this behavioral phenomenon. Suppression of electroencephalogram (EEG) power in the mu frequency band, an index of motor activation, typically reflects neural mirroring. However, contradictory findings exist regarding the association between mu suppression and motor familiarity in infant EEG studies. In this study, we investigated the neural underpinnings reflecting the role of familiarity in action perception. We measured neural processing of familiar (grasp) and novel (tool-use) actions in 9- and 12-month-old infants. Specifically, we measured infants’ distinct motor/visual activity and explored functional connectivity associated with these processes. Mu suppression was stronger for grasping than for tool use, whereas significant mu and occipital alpha (indexing visual activity) suppression were evident for both actions. Interestingly, selective motor–visual functional connectivity was found during observation of familiar action, a pattern not observed for novel action. Thus, the neural correlates of perception of familiar actions may be best understood in terms of a functional neural network rather than isolated regional activity. Our findings provide novel insights on analytic approaches for identifying motor-specific neural activity while also considering neural networks involved in observing motorically familiar versus unfamiliar actions.

Rain, reindeer, digging and tundra: children’s visual perception of an archaeological expedition to Northernmost Sápmi (Finnish Lapland)

ABSTRACT In this paper Idiscuss aset of photographs taken by my daughters with disposable cameras, to consider how they perceived an archaeological expedition to northernmost Sápmi (Finnish Lapland). My daughters’ photographic documentation illustrates the views that children from southern Finland have on archaeological fieldwork in an extreme northern environment. Their photographs resemble partly the tourism promotional imagery and Instagram posts, which place emphasis on the impressive landscape, engaging activities, and the gear related to those activities. Based on these imageries, and my personal impressions, thegenius loci of this area for outsiders are largely defined by the mountainous scenery and midsummer snow, both unique to this region within Finland. My daughters’ imagery conveys amixture of familiarity and alienation. There is an awe of facing the new and alien, immersive mountain landscape and the novelty of, e.g., ahelicopter ride to the study site in the middle of aroadless wilderness, and afascination in the familiar expedition activities together with trusted people which creates asense of at-homeness. The familiar actions carried out by familiar people appear to act as important means for placemaking and securing the being-in-the-world, which carries also wider importance beyond this case study.

Performance studies. Experiments with the Methods of Transformation of Sociocultural Landscape

In the article, the concept of performance is considered as a leading communicative art practice of socialization of distinct spaces of Western Ukrainian cities. Performance studies are viewed as an effective global interdisciplinary field that views performance and uses performativity as a method of studying various cultural processes and practice of setting up and collaborating of the social groups and urbanistic spaces. In this context, performance art pieces, artistic projects, political actionism and other cultural practices and experiences are presented on the examples of actionism of Western Ukraine. Method of synthesis that helped to compare and generalize scientific sources and literature is applied; as well as the systematic method for the analysis of culturological aspects of performance and sociological method, when culture is considered as a factor in the organization of public life and the formation of the intellectual landscape. The methodology of the field research gave the work practical significance, due to the use of valuable photography materials, memories of the participants of performative practices. Observing the organization of the performance allowed to examine its reflexive effect on the audience. Performance studies are an important discipline that can be useful for all groups of the socio-cultural urban landscape. Studies of performance allow us to understand distinct world cultures or to evaluate our own behavior critically. Artists frequently develop their intuitive abilities through performance, look for hidden meanings in familiar objects and actions. The practice or contemplation of the performance by the consumers of the culture of “bread and spectacles” (Latin: panem et circenses) may consist in understanding one’s own assessment of the circumstances, comparing it with the perception of others, perhaps by changing one’s position. Government institutions have the opportunity to master additional resources to gain understanding of distinct environments of the city and at the same time to acquire effective methods of personnel management.

Violence, Social Movements, and Black Freedom Struggles

George Floyd’s murder by police on 26 May 2020 set off a cycle of struggle that was notable for its size, intensity, and rate of diffusion. Starting in Minneapolis, the uprising quickly spread to dozens of other major cities and brought with it a repertoire that included riots, arson, and looting. In many places, these tactics coexisted with more familiar actions like public assemblies and mass marches; however, the inflection these tactics gave to the cycle of contention is not easily reconciled with the protest repertoire most frequently mobilized during movement campaigns in the United States today. This discrepancy has led to extensive commentary by scholars and movement participants, who have often weighed in by considering the moral and strategic efficacy of the chosen tactics. Such considerations should not be discounted. Nevertheless, I argue that both the dynamics of contention witnessed during the uprising and their ambivalent relationship to the established protest repertoire must first be understood in historical terms. By considering the relationship between violence, social movements, and Black freedom struggles in this way, I argue that scholars can develop a better understanding of current events while anticipating how the dynamics of contention are likely to develop going forward. Being attentive to these dynamics should in turn inform our research agendas, and it is with this aim in mind that I offer the following ten theses.

Covenanting in Sixteenth-century Scotland

In 1638 the National Covenant deliberately looked backwards, as well as forwards, by incorporating the text of the Negative Confession (1581). Its authors utilised the patchwork of sixteenth-century covenant ideas by drawing upon religious bonding, confessions of faith and the coronation oath. Deeply familiar actions and gestures were used alongside the words, and especially the emotional ritual of taking a vow with hands upraised. This resonated with the broader identity and culture of protestants as a godly people, who, like the Old Testament Israelites, upheld their covenantal relationship with God by the ‘purity'of their reformed worship and discipline.

Duration judgments in children and adolescents with and without mild intellectual disability

BackgroundWhile the ability to measure time correctly is crucial for adaptation to the external physical and social environment, to date, research on timing ability and its development in individuals with intellectual disability (ID) is unfortunately remarkably scarce. AimsIn the present study, we investigated the ability of individuals with mild ID to estimate durations and the development of this ability from 11 to 19 years, in comparison to typically developing (TD) individuals. Methods and proceduresParticipants with mild ID and TD participants matched on chronological age completed two temporal tasks: (1) a temporal bisection of auditory stimuli, in which they had to decide whether arbitrary stimulus duration was more similar to the short (200 ms) or the long (800 ms) standard previously learned, and (2) a temporal categorization of familiar actions, in which short, medium or long target durations had to be paired with one of three comparison action durations. Outcomes and resultsTemporal performance was systematically impaired in participants with mild ID. Moreover, the temporal impairment increased with age in the bisection task but not in the categorization task. Conclusions and implicationsThese findings suggest that the ability to estimate durations develops at a slower pace in individuals with mild ID compared to TD individuals.

Did we find a copycat? Do as I Do in a domestic cat (Felis catus)

This study shows evidence of a domestic cat (Felis catus) being able to successfully learn to reproduce human-demonstrated actions based on the Do as I Do paradigm. The subject was trained to reproduce a small set of familiar actions on command “Do it!” before the study began. To test feature–contingent behavioural similarity and control for stimulus enhancement, our test consisted of a modified version of the two-action procedure, combined with the Do as I Do paradigm. Instead of showing two different actions on an object to different subjects, we applied a within-subject design and showed the two actions to the same subject in separate trials. We show evidence that a well-socialized companion cat was able to reproduce actions demonstrated by a human model by reproducing two different actions that were demonstrated on the same object. Our experiment provides the first evidence that the Do as I Do paradigm can be applied to cats, suggesting that the ability to recognize behavioural similarity may fall within the range of the socio-cognitive skills of this species. The ability of reproducing the actions of a heterospecific human model in well-socialized cats may pave the way for future studies addressing cats’ imitative skills.

Creating nonbelieved memories for bizarre actions using an imagination inflation procedure

SummaryThe current experiments examined the creation of nonbelieved true and false memories after imagining bizarre and familiar actions using the imagination inflation procedure (Goff &amp; Roediger, 1998). In both experiments, participants took part in three sessions. In Session 1, participants had to perform or imagine simple familiar actions (e.g., “stir the water with the spoon”) and bizarre actions (e.g., “balance the spoon on your nose”). A day later, participants needed to imagine simple actions of which some were new actions, and some were old actions that appeared in the first session. After a week, the participants completed a recognition task. For those actions that were correctly or incorrectly remembered as having been performed, the participant was challenged that the action was not performed in order to evoke nonbelieved true and false memories. In general, we found that the imagination inflation procedure can successfully induce participants to produce nonbelieved memories. In Study 1, we successfully induced nonbelieved memories for bizarre actions, although in general nonbelieved memory rates were low. In Study 2, more participants formed nonbelieved memories for bizarre actions than for familiar actions. Also, we found that especially belief was more susceptible to revision when memories were challenged than recollection. In two experiments, we showed that nonbelieved memories can successfully be induced for both familiar and bizarre actions.

Peer engagement in toddlers with autism: Community implementation of dyadic and individual Joint Attention, Symbolic Play, Engagement, and Regulation intervention.

Although young children may participate in education and intervention programs that take place in classrooms or groups, there is little information about how toddlers with special needs, and specifically toddlers with autism, are engaging with their peers. This study takes place in a public center-based early intervention program for toddlers with autism. Classrooms of toddlers were randomly assigned to an individual social communication intervention or the same intervention adapted to include a peer. Children in both groups made gains in social communication and play skills. Children who had the peer intervention were more engaged with peers when an adult was present, but not when the children were unsupported. This article adds information about early skills that may be important for children to master so that they have more success when trying to interact with their peers. These skills include understanding language (referred to as "receptive language" at 12 months or more) and play skills including building and stacking (referred to as "combination play"-for example, building with blocks or completing a puzzle) and extending familiar actions to themselves, others, and figures (referred to as "presymbolic play"-for example, putting a bottle to the doll or to themselves). Understanding which skills to target can help practitioners focus their instruction to build children's skills toward connecting with peers through play.

‘Nemeses! Dragons! Symbolism!’: queering the fantasy hero narrative in Nimona

ABSTRACT Of the available narratives in fantasy fiction, the noble hero clashing with a maniacal villain – often over a helpless damsel – is easily recognisable and easily critiqued for its reliance on patriarchal, heteronormative logic and binary notions of good and evil. Noelle Stevenson’s charmingly queer graphic novel Nimona takes the additional step of reorienting the familiar commitments, relations, and actions of the fantasy hero to invite its characters (and readers) to reimagine the human beyond the parameters of what the genre typically allows it to be. This article reads Nimona as a ‘monster’ figure whose presence instigates the reformulation of fantasy masculinity made available to both ostensible hero and ostensible villain. It analyzes the consequences of Nimona’s marginalisation and the implications of Stevenson’s representation of queer trauma. Ultimately, I suggest that through the comics medium, Stevenson reinvents the fantasy genre as a site of inquiry that encourages self-reflection and asks all who engage it what we have overlooked in its traditionally straight world.

Infants' Goal Prediction for Simple ActionEvents: The Role of Experience and Agency Cues.

Looking times and gaze behavior indicate that infants can predict the goalstate of anobserved simple actionevent (e.g., object-directed grasping) already in the first year of life. The present paper mainly focuses on infants' predictive gaze-shifts toward the goal of an ongoing action. For this, infants need to generate a forward model of the to-be-obtained goalstate and to disengage their gaze from the moving agent at a time when information about the actionevent is still incomplete. By about 6months of age, infants show goal-predictive gaze-shifts, but mainly for familiar actions that they can perform themselves (e.g., grasping) and for familiar agents (e.g., a human hand). Therefore, some theoretical models have highlighted close relations between infants' ability for action-goal prediction and theirmotor development and/or emerging action experience. Recent research indicates that infants can also predict actiongoals of familiar simple actions performed by non-human agents (e.g., object-directed grasping by a mechanical claw) when these agents display agencycues, such as self-propelled movement, equifinality of goalapproach, or production of a salient actioneffect. This paper provides a review on relevant findings and theoretical models, and proposes that the impacts of action experience and of agencycues can be explained from an action-event perspective. In particular, infants' goal-predictive gaze-shifts are seen as resulting from an interplay between bottom-up processing of perceptual information and top-down influences exerted by event schemata that store information about previously executed or observed actions.

Crosslinguistic Differences in the Encoding of Causality: Transitivity Preferences in English and Japanese Children and Adults

ABSTRACTLanguages differ in how they encode causal events, placing greater or lesser emphasis on the agent or patient of the action. Little is known about how these preferences emerge and the relative influence of cognitive biases and language-specific input at different stages in development. In these studies, we investigated the emergence of sentence preferences to describe causal events in English- and Japanese-speaking children (aged three and five years) and compared this to preferences displayed by adults. We studied two factors suggested to influence this choice: Language (Corpus study & Experiment 1) and Intentionality (Experiment 2). Participants watched videos depicting familiar and novel causal actions, and made a best-match choice between a transitive and intransitive description. We found a stronger preference for intransitive sentences with causal verbs and more frequent argument omissions in Japanese child-directed speech than in English child-directed speech. The trajectory of acquisition in the selection of transitive sentences for causal events differed between languages. For intentionality, with familiar verbs both Japanese and English speakers selected fewer transitives for accidental than intentional scenes, but this pattern was more pronounced in Japanese speakers. However, with novel verbs, only five-year-olds and adults showed this preference. These data provide important new information to constrain theories about the process of learning to map event structure to language, and its interdependence with intentionality and the distributional properties of linguistic input to children.

An Exploratory Study of Personification and Hyperbole in Selected Siswati Poetry

This is an exploratory study of two selected figure of speech: personification and hyperbole. They are, however, selected as key rhetoric devices that depict the poetic language and style. They are central figures of speech that are significant in the poetic sentences and semantic content. This study is guided by Formalism approach based on poetic sounds, syntactic and semantic construction. They are used to achieve a special meaning or effect in all modes of discourse. They are integral to the functioning of language in a connotative manner. These figures of speech extend the meaning of words or phrases beyond the normal way as a result of mental association. Their functions are for the emphasis on ironic effect and animation. The formalist approach is adopted because it helps the readers to analyse the writer’s technical prowess and craft skills. It believes that in any work of art such as poetry, the poetic sometimes deliberately defamiliarizes the raw material and objects of familiar actions and words that he uses to build up his poem.