Motor Intentionality Research Articles

Evidence of motor intentions in plants: A kinematical study.

"How" an action is performed is not solely determined by biomechanical constraints, but it depends on the agent's intention, that is, "why" the action is performed. Recent findings suggest that intentions can be specified at a tangible and quantifiable level in the kinematics of movements; that is, different motor intentions translate into different kinematic patterns. In the present study, we used 3D kinematical analysis to investigate whether the organization of climbing plants' approach-to-grasp action is sensitive to the kind of intention driving their movement toward potential support, namely individual or social. For the individual condition, a plant in isolation acted upon the support. For the social condition, two plants were located in the same pot opposite to each other with a support in the middle. Results indicate differences in kinematics depending on the context within which the plant is acting. In the presence of neighbors, climbing plants are able to modify their behaviors to maximize their long-term gains, including the grasping of a potential support. Overall, these data suggest that the organization of climbing plants' kinematics is sensitive to the "intention" driving their movement toward a potential support. To discuss this phenomenon, we capitalize on the concept of motor intentionality in plants and on available theories concerned to motor cognition. We suggest how they could be revisited to explain the intentionality component inherent in plant life and other brainless organisms. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Social Attitude Towards a Robot is Promoted by Motor-Induced Embodiment Independently of Spatial Perspective

Humans can enter into social relations with robots through different spatial perspectives. In the telepresence perspective, the human sees through the eyes of the robot. In the face-to-face perspective the human faces the robot and interacts in a self-other relation. During robotic telepresence, we have shown that embodiment into robots can be promoted by reciprocal and synchronous stimuli in the form of intentional movements or passive tactile stimulations. Here we investigate the impact of different spatial perspectives coupled to these sensory-motor manipulations on human subjects’ social perception of robots. Through a series of experiments, we demonstrate that independent of the telepresence vs. face-to-face self-perspective, the sense of agency as induced by synchronous human-robot movements is crucial for generating positive changes of robot acceptability. We suggest that motor intentionality most clearly influences our social perception of robots.

Jak tělu rozumět tělem. Příspěvek fenomenologie k překonání limitů mechanistického paradigmatu ve fyzioterapii

This article aims to explain how Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological account of embodiment contributes to the theory and practice of physiotherapy. The mechanistic conception of the body, to which physiotherapy usually refers, assumes a universal model of its functioning and interprets its relationship to the environment causally. In fact, however, it does not allow a satisfactory explanation of the efficiency of the therapeutic methods used in practice. In contrast, Merleau-Ponty’s concept of motor intentionality points to the fact that the body “understands” the practical meaning of a situation. Bodily understanding is then manifested in particular by the ability to adequately differentiate, adapt or vary motor and postural responses to environmental challenges. This change in the conception of embodiment also has important implications for understanding the therapist-patient relationship and the intervention itself. Physiotherapists should draw more on the fact that they are themselves a body and, on this basis, guide the patient’s bodily intentionality towards a more developed understanding of the practical meaning of situations.

Mathematics embodied: Merleau-Ponty on geometry and algebra as fields of motor enaction

This paper aims to clarify Merleau-Ponty’s contribution to an embodied-enactive account of mathematical cognition. I first identify the main points of interest in the current discussions of embodied higher cognition and explain how they relate to Merleau-Ponty and his sources, in particular Husserl’s late works. Subsequently, I explain these convergences in greater detail by more specifically discussing the domains of geometry and algebra and by clarifying the role of gestalt psychology in Merleau-Ponty’s account. Beyond that, I explain how, for Merleau-Ponty, mathematical cognition requires not only the presence and actual manipulation of some concrete perceptible symbols but, more strongly, how it is fundamentally linked to the structural transformation of the concrete configurations of symbolic systems to which these symbols appertain. Furthemore, I fill a gap in the literature by explaining Merleau-Ponty’s claim that these structural transformations are operated through motor intentionality. This makes it possible, in turn, to contrast Merleau-Ponty’s approach to ontologically idealistic and realistic views on mathematical objects. On Merleau-Ponty’s account, mathematical objects are relational entities, that is, gestalts that necessarily imply situated cognizers to whom they afford a specific type of engagement in the world and on whom they depend in their eventual structural transformations. I argue that, by attributing a strongly constitutive role to phenomenal configurations and their motor transformation in mathematical thinking, Merleau-Ponty contributes to clarifying the worldly, historical, and socio-cultural aspects of mathematical truths without compromising what we perceive as their universality, certainty, and necessity.

A Husserlian contribution: concerning intentional movement and understanding in sporting activities

ABSTRACT This article contributes to an ongoing discussion within sports philosophy concerning how to understand intentional movement in sporting activities. The operations of ‘representation intentionality’, ‘motor intentionality’ and ‘muscular intentionality’ play an increasing role in the attempt to nuance the relation between mind, body and world involved in physical activities. While most scholars tend to reduce one aspect to the other, Breivik has suggested that we can gain a more integrated picture combining the different forms of intentionality as different layers of understanding in action. Though different perspectives of intentionality certainly illuminate different aspects of actions, we believe the ontological implications such an eclectic model entails exceeds the potential benefits. In this article we present a critical evaluation of the exact meaning and exploratory scope of these perspectives by entering into a dialogue with Breivik’s main sources, Rizzolatti, Merleau-Ponty and Searle. We argue that we can achieve a more consistent theory by reconceptualizing the different ‘layers of intentionality’ as different ‘levels of embodiment’ within a Husserlian frame of hermeneutic phenomenology. Finally, we empathize Husserl’s potential contribution to the field of sports philosophy illustrated through sporting examples with a focus on climbing.

Kinematic Accelerometry Assessment Of Music-Based Motor Training in Stroke Rehabilitation

<h3>Research Objectives</h3> To use a novel limb acceleration measure to reveal mechanisms of improved paretic limb control following music-based rehabilitation. <h3>Design</h3> A consecutive sample. <h3>Setting</h3> A music and health research facility in Toronto, CA. <h3>Participants</h3> 30 community dwellers aged 30-79 years in the chronic stroke phase with minimal volitional control of the affected limb. <h3>Interventions</h3> Nine training sessions thirty-minutes in length were administered three times per week by a Neurologic Music Therapist. The music-based training incorporated mapping rhythmically cued functional arm movements onto digital sonification touch tablets. The paretic limb's acceleration profile was recorded at 1000 Hz from a wrist-worn accelerometer. <h3>Main Outcome Measures</h3> Estimates of power-spectral-density were obtained with an approximately 1-s sliding window and a 50% window overlap across the entire training session. The power-spectral-density was computed as the median of all the windows within each trace. The dominant peak in the function was then identified and quantified as the height of the peak (i.e., peak-power). Peak-power was then used to quantify functional changes in limb control across sessions. <h3>Results</h3> Repeated-measures ANOVA for peak-power revealed a main effect of session (p < .001) and follow-up trend analyses revealed a significant linear trend, highlighting continuous motor improvement across all sessions. T-tests were then used to determine that movements of the paretic limb increased in peak power (p = .001; 95% CI = -.0002, - .0007) from session 1 (M = .00004) to session 9 (M = .0002) with peak-power being localized within the lower frequency spectrum (i.e., 4.4 Hz). <h3>Conclusions</h3> Peak-power increases within the lower frequency spectrum indicates improved volitional motor control and intentionality of paretic arm movements. Such functional changes in limb acceleration represent a mechanism underlying improved motor outcomes in music-based stroke interventions. <h3>Author(s) Disclosures</h3> The authors have nothing to disclose.

Embodied higher cognition: insights from Merleau-Ponty’s interpretation of motor intentionality

This paper clarifies Merleau-Ponty’s original account of “higher-order” cognition as fundamentally embodied and enacted. Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy inspired theories that deemphasize overlaps between conceptual knowledge and motor intentionality or, on the contrary, focus exclusively on abstract thought. In contrast, this paper explores the link between Merleau-Ponty’s account of motor intentionality and his interpretations of our capacity to understand and interact productively with cultural symbolic systems. I develop my interpretation based on Merleau-Ponty’s analysis of two neuropathological modifications of motor intentionality, the case of the brain-injured war veteran Schneider, and a neurological disorder known as Gerstmann’s syndrome. Building on my analysis of Schneider’s sensorimotor compensatory performances in relation to his limitations in the domains of algebra, geometry, and language usage, I demonstrate a strong continuity between the sense of embodiment and enaction at all these levels. Based on Merleau-Ponty’s interpretations, I argue that “higher-order” cognition is impaired in Schneider insofar as his injury limits his sensorimotor capacity to dynamically produce comparatively more complex differentiations of any given phenomenal structure. I then show how Merleau-Ponty develops and specifies his interpretation of Schneider’s intellectual difficulties in relation to the ambiguous role of the body, and in particular the hand, in Gerstmann’s syndrome. I explain how Merleau-Ponty defends the idea that sensorimotor and quasi-representational cognition are mutually irreducible, while maintaining that symbol-based cognition is a fundamentally enactive and embodied process.

Fenomenologia, cognitivismo e teoria musicale

This paper explores the relationships between phenomenology, cognitive sciences, and music theory. West Coast school of phenomenology, by subscribing a Fregean reading of Husserl, interpreted Husserlian philosophy as strictly related to cognitive computationalism (Fodor) and Artificial Intelligence project (Minsky). In his musicological research, David Lewin was involved in this suggestion and modeled mental actions to formalize musical perceptions. The study of phenomenological intentionality and time-consciousness can be useful to improve Lewin’s model. Furthermore, the idea of embodied cognition is noteworthy in order to analyze motor intentionality in musical experiences.

Correction to Scarpina et al. (2020).

In this single-case study, the Circles-Lines Coupling Task was administered to a left-parietal-brain-damaged individual. The cerebral lesion caused a central proprioceptive loss, relative to the impaired right hand, when out of the visual control. For the 1st time in literature, we sought to investigate whether the movement of the unaffected hand induced an efficient coupling effect on the movement of the affected one. The bimanual task was performed in the presence and absence of visual input. The patient's performance was compared with that of healthy controls. We observed the traditional bimanual coupling effect in healthy controls. Moreover, we also replicated the effect when they performed the task blindfolded. In the case of the patient, both hands showed the typical ovalization of the line trajectory when the task was performed in visual modality. It is interesting that when the patient performed the task blindfolded, the trajectories of the impaired right hand seemed to be not influenced by the concomitant circular movement of the spared left hand. The movement of the unaffected hand induced a bimanual coupling effect on the movement of the affected one only when the visual input was available. In absence of a visual feedback, the aberrant proprioceptive information might preclude the emerging of bimanual coupling, even in the case of a preserved motor intentionality and planning. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Wax On, Wax Off! Habits, Sport Skills, and Motor Intentionality

What role does habit formation play in the development of sport skills? We argue that motor habits are both necessary for and constitutive of sensorimotor skill as they support an automatic, yet inherently intelligent and flexible, form of action control. Intellectualists about skills generally assume that what makes action intelligent and flexible is its intentionality, and that intentionality must be necessarily cognitive in nature to allow for both deliberation and explicit goal-representation. Against Intellectualism we argue that the habitual behaviours that compose skilful action are accompanied by their specific, non-cognitive form of intentionality: this is motor intentionality, which is purposive and adaptive while involving no explicit deliberation or goal representation. Our account of habit based on Motor Intentionality explains why the formation of motor habits can sometimes act as the sole basis of skilful acquisition: Motor Intentionality is inherently purposeful because it is an embodied source of sensorimotor anticipation, pre-reflective motivation, and pragmatic know-how. Skill development through exercise always builds on a motor intentional component even when it is guided by Deliberate Practice to the point that, pace Intellectualism, Deliberate Practice is disclosed, not constrained, by habit formation. As suggested by the fact that repetitive exercises can play a major role in the development of flexible and intelligent sport skills, automatism is not a drawback for strategic control and improvisation but rather their pragmatic foundation.

Living in the age of the embodied screen

ABSTRACT The technological virtual converges with our contemporary existence in a multitude of ways, which suggests a need to interrogate the question of the virtual existentially. Merleau-Ponty’s existential phenomenological account of embodiment is invaluable in this regard because the virtual is encountered from the basis of the facticity of the embodied individual – a facticity that is closely related to perception and motor intentionality. The current article argues that these characteristics of the body-subject should be taken into consideration in order to develop a clearer description of the virtual. However, beyond an embodied account that relates to early technologies, Merleau-Ponty also presents through his concept of the flesh a novel avenue for the ontological investigation of the virtual. The flesh describes the intertwining of the body-subject and the world, which is suggestive of a new account of the individual’s sensibility in relation to the virtual. An original concept is suggested to describe the existential-ontological structure of the virtual: The embodied screen. The embodied screen as neologism presents an alternative conceptualisation of the coincidence of the body-subject (who understands the world spatially) with the virtual (as non-spatial). By tracing imaginative signification and embodied habitude in terms of the virtual, this article suggests certain existential implications of the virtual for contemporary being.

¿Es posible un abordaje fenomenológico del efecto placebo? Los alcances del esquema corporal en Merleau-Ponty

Se comparan críticamente las teorías del condicionamiento y la expectativa. Luego se retoma la propuesta de Oron Frenkel (2008) a fin de juzgar si la noción de intencionalidad motriz permite establecer un marco teórico superador de las deficiencias de dichas teorías. Finalmente se analiza la noción de forma y los órdenes físico, vital y humano, propuestos en La Estructura del Comportamiento (1976), como abordajes alternativos. Como conclusión se destaca el valor de la experiencia del paciente en los ensayos y se plantea la posibilidad de redefinir la noción tradicional de conciencia entendida como formación de representaciones y juicios.

¿Es posible un abordaje fenomenológico del efecto placebo? Los alcances del esquema corporal en Merleau-Ponty

The article carries out a critical comparison of the theories of conditioning and expectation. It takes up Oron Frenkel’s proposal in order to determine whether the notion of motor intentionality makes it possible to establish a theoretical framework that overcomes the deficiencies of those theories. Finally, it analyzes the category of form and the physical, vital, and human orders set forth in The Structure of Behavior (1976) as alternative approaches. The conclusion highlights the value of the patient’s experience in trials, and suggest the possibility of redefining the traditional notion of consciousness understood as the formation of representations and judgments.

Phenomenology vs Symbolic AI: Hubert Dreyfus’s Philosophy of Skill Acquisition

A conflict between artificial intelligence (AI) researchers and phenomenologist Hubert Dreyfus arose in the 1960s and continued until the 2000s. The creators of the first AI programs believed that skill acquisition is a matter of solving problems by using particular mental representations,or heuristics. Dreyfus set out to prove that heuristics are not needed for skill acquisition because the human mind and body are capable of reacting to problematic situations in a flexible way without any mental representations. By clarifying the backstory of the conflict and analyzing the fundamental contradictions between the two theories of skill, the article shows how the phenomenology of skill acquisition originated from a critique of symbolic AI. Dreyfus developed his understanding of interconnections between mind and body in opposition to the associationism in the theories of Herbert Simon, Allen Newell and Edward Feigenbaum. He maintained that human beings have fringe consciousness, insight and tolerance of ambiguity and that they have a specific body structure and needs which make it possible to discriminate between relevant and irrelevant features in the environment and get a maximum grip of it. The author analyzes how theories of learning created within symbolic AI influenced Dreyfus’s five-stage model of skill acquisition. That model explained why programs by Simon and his colleagues achieved initial success, but it also exposed their limitations. To clarify the teleology of skill, Dreyfus explored how the idea of motor intentionality is connected with neural network modelling. Two perspectives on the role of Dreyfus in the history of AI are outlined together with the reasons why his philosophy had almost no effect on the AI community even though it was influential in the social sciences and humanities. Finally, current challenges facing the phenomenology of skill acquisition are explored.

Habit, Bodyhood, and Merleau-Ponty

The phenomenal body is an intriguing concept, and Merleau-Ponty’s notion of habit, coupled with motor intentionality, provides a novel perspective on its inner workings. I contend that his portrayal of habit tacitly bears two faces – motoric habit and instrumental habit respectively. The former is an attunement to some bodily possibilities that are already at our disposal while the latter is an explicit relation to external objects and a process of incorporating those objects into our own bodies. These two notions play into each other, creating a mechanism that offers an intuitive illustration and simple productive definition for a dynamic picture of bodyhood. Furthermore, it carries an internal delimitation that marks the boundaries of its application. The result is a view that provides something new to current interpretations of Merleau-Ponty, as well as potential applications in areas that derived from his appeals to motor intentionality.

The Brain in (Willed) Action: A Meta-Analytical Comparison of Imaging Studies on Motor Intentionality and Sense of Agency.

Voluntary actions can be fractionated in different phenomena: from the emergence of intentions and the ensuing motor plans and actions, to the anticipation and monitoring of their outcomes, to the appreciation of their congruency with intentions and to the eventual emergence of a sense of agency. It follows that motor intention and the sense of agency should occur at different stages in the normal generation of willed actions. Both these processes have been associated with a fronto-parietal motor network, but no study has investigated to what extent the two experiences can be dissociated for the brain regions involved. To this end, we assessed the PET/fMRI literature on agency and intentionality using a meta-analytic technique based on a hierarchical clustering algorithm. Beside a shared brain network involving the meso-frontal and prefrontal regions, the middle insula and subcortical structures, we found that motor intention and the sense of agency are functionally underpinned by separable sets of brain regions: an “intentionality network,” involving the rostral area of the mesial frontal cortex (middle cingulum and pre-supplementary motor area), the anterior insula and the parietal lobules, and a “self-agency network,” which involves the posterior areas of the mesial frontal cortex (the SMA proper), the posterior insula, the occipital lobe and the cerebellum. We were then able to confirm this functional organization by a subsequent seed-based fMRI resting-state functional connectivity analysis, with seeds derived from the intentionality/sense of agency specific clusters of the medial wall of the frontal lobe. Our results suggest the existence of a rostro-caudal gradient within the mesial frontal cortex, with the more anterior regions linked to the concept of motor intentionality and the brain areas located more posteriorly associated with the direct monitoring between the action and its outcome. This suggestion is reinforced by the association between the sense of agency and the activation of the occipital lobes, to suggest a direct comparison between the movement and its external (e.g., visual) consequences. The shared network may be important for the integration of intentionality and agency in a coherent appreciation of self-generated actions.

Motor intentionality and the intentionality of improvisation: a contribution to a phenomenology of musical improvisation

The intentionality of improvisation represents surely one of the most pressing and controversial issues in contemporary action theory: how do we find the way to characterize the proper intentionality of improvisation, which is an unplanned yet intentional action? This article will address this question bringing together Merleau-Ponty’s motor intentionality and Bergson’s conception of duration. My argument will unfold in three main stages. First, I will briefly describe the traditional scheme that is used to think of intentional action in contemporary action theory and discuss how the phenomenon of improvisation casts doubts on it. Second, I will outline an initial, and provisional account of improvisation by crossing the descriptions of musical improvisation provided by Jankelevitch with the testimonials of two improvisatory composers—Enrico Pieranunzi and Keith Jarrett—and reports from Charles Rosen, an American pianist and Roger Sessions, an American composer. Finally, I will refine the basic concepts and lay out a phenomenological account of improvisation, by extending and applying the phenomenological notion of motor intentionality to the examples and testimonials gathered from the observation of a specific kind of improvisatory activity—musical composition. This methodology is intended to contrast both with more standard philosophical approaches based on hypothetical examples, and with more standard laboratory-based methodologies in cognitive sciences, psychology, and experimental philosophy. Overall, this approach is intended to redress the balance of action theory—one-sided directed towards planning, as a key aspect of human agency—with an analysis of the bodily and responsive aspect of intentionality.

The use of embodied imagination and empathy to bridge actor–character dissonance

When a script stipulates actions, gestural routines and mental models for a character that clash with the personal values of the actor, it creates dissonance between what the actor (as person) believes, represents or feels, and that which the character (as fictional construct) is interpreted to represent. This dissonance may negatively impact on the believability of the actor inhabiting the ‘as if’ world of the character. The article proposes a theoretical approach to navigating this potentially performance-restricting dissonance through a cross-disciplinary approach that draws on embodiment, embodied imagination and empathy. Personal restrictions, values, socialization, culture and impulse avoidances are subjectively sculpted and embodied in and through lived experiences. In articulating the proposed approach, the article places emphasis on practically guiding and enabling the actor to manage these embodied experiences, personal values and subjective restrictions in relation to material that is perceived to be challenging and uncomfortable. This article does not aim at theorizing or expanding on character development techniques, but rather to facilitate finding ways to navigate actor–character dissonance while remaining sensitive to actors and their respective processes in engaging with, and depicting, a character in a competent and believable manner. Instead of forcing actors to work through restrictions or adversely dislodging talented actors from a production due to seemingly unmanageable dissonances, this article argues for possible solutions to manage contradictory values and stances respectfully through a multi-layered process. The article will address concepts such as personal views, mental models, socialization, will, empathy, imagination, gesture and motor intentionality.

Maurice Merleau‐Ponty's concept of motor intentionality: Unifying two kinds of bodily agency

AbstractI develop an interpretation of Maurice Merleau‐Ponty's concept of motor intentionality, one that emerges out of a reading of his presentation of a now classic case study in neuropathology—patient Johann Schneider—in Phenomenology of Perception. I begin with Merleau‐Ponty's prescriptions for how we should use the pathological as a guide to the normal, a method I call triangulation. I then turn to his presentation of Schneider's unusual case. I argue that we should treat all of Schneider's behaviors as pathological, not only his abstract movements (e.g., pointing), as is commonly acknowledged in the secondary literature, but also crucially his concrete movements (e.g., grasping). Using these facts of Schneider's illness, I reconstruct a ‘fundamental function’ of consciousness, as Merleau‐Ponty called it, in which there are two kinds of bodily agency: the power of the body to be solicited by a situation and the power of the body to project a situation. I propose that these powers became dissociated in Schneider's case, as evidenced by his abstract and concrete movements, while in the normal case, these powers comprise a dynamic unity, enacted as motor intentionality. I also discuss how my interpretation complements Merleau‐Ponty's assertion that motor intentions exist between mind and matter.

Searle, Merleau-Ponty, Rizzolatti – three perspectives on Intentionality and action in sport

Actions in sport are intentional in character. They are directed at and are about something. This understanding of intentional action is common in continental as well as analytic philosophy. In sport philosophy, intentionality has received relatively little attention, but has more recently come on the agenda. In addition to what we can call ‘action intentionality,’ studied by philosophers like Searle, the phenomenological approach forwarded by Merleau-Ponty has opened up for a concept of ‘motor intentionality,’ which means a basic bodily attention and relatedness to the surrounding world. This conception is very relevant for the study of bodily actions as we find them in sports. However, there may be even deeper layers. The identification of mirror neurons in the brain has opened up for a type of almost ‘muscular intentionality’ whereby a simple bodily movement like grasping a cup to drink seems to be intentionally controlled and orchestrated. My goal in this paper is to discuss the relation between different levels of intentionality, such as a) ‘action intentionality’ operating at a conscious cognitive level, as for instance, when a player shoots a goal in football, b) the ‘motor intentionality’ directing the bodily movements when kicking the ball, and c) the muscular ‘mirror neuron intentionality’ of the goal keeper which is in operation when the keeper is seeing how the kicker’s foot hits the ball. How are these different layers of intentionality related and how can they give a more nuanced and integrated picture of the body–mind in action in sports?