Recruitment of both the mirror and the mentalizing networks when observing social interactions depicted by point-lights: a neuroimaging study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Understanding social interactions requires the ability to accurately interpret conspecifics' actions, sometimes only on the basis of subtle body language analysis. Here we address an important issue that has not yet received much attention in social neuroscience, that of an interaction between two agents. We attempted to isolate brain responses to two individuals interacting compared to two individuals acting independently.

Methodology/principal findings

We used minimalistic point-light displays to depict the characters, as they provide the most straightforward way to isolate mechanisms used to extract information from motion per se without any interference with other visual information. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) method was used to determine whi

SUBMITTER: Centelles L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3018423 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature