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Somogyi E, Hamilton M, Chinn LK, Jacquey L, Heed T, Hoffmann M, Lockman JJ, Fagard J, O'Regan JK. Tactile training facilitates infants' ability to reach to targets on the body. Child Dev 2023; 94:e154-e165. [PMID: 36651681 DOI: 10.1111/cdev.13891] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/19/2023]
Abstract
This longitudinal study investigated the effect of experience with tactile stimulation on infants' ability to reach to targets on the body, an important adaptive skill. Infants were provided weekly tactile stimulation on eight body locations from 4 to 8 months of age (N = 11), comparing their ability to reach to the body to infants in a control group who did not receive stimulation (N = 10). Infants who received stimulation were more likely to successfully reach targets on the body than controls by 7 months of age. These findings indicate that tactile stimulation facilitates the development of reaching to the body by allowing infants to explore the sensorimotor correlations emerging from the stimulation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eszter Somogyi
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS UMR 8002, Université Paris Cité, Paris, France.,Department of Psychology, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, United Kingdom
| | - Mollie Hamilton
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS UMR 8002, Université Paris Cité, Paris, France
| | - Lisa K Chinn
- Texas Institute for Measurement, Evaluation, and Statistics, University of Houston, Houston, Texas, USA
| | - Lisa Jacquey
- ULR 4072 - PSITEC - Psychologie : Interactions, Temps, Emotions, Cognition, University of Lille, Lille, France
| | - Tobias Heed
- Department of Psychology and Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria
| | - Matej Hoffmann
- Department of Cybernetics, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic
| | - Jeffrey J Lockman
- Department of Psychology, Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA
| | - Jacqueline Fagard
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS UMR 8002, Université Paris Cité, Paris, France
| | - J Kevin O'Regan
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS UMR 8002, Université Paris Cité, Paris, France
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2
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Sen U, Gredebäck G. Learning limb-specific contingencies in early infancy. INFANCY 2022; 27:1116-1131. [PMID: 36124446 DOI: 10.1111/infa.12506] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/14/2022] [Revised: 08/18/2022] [Accepted: 09/06/2022] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Most research with the mobile paradigm has the underlying assumption that young infants can selectively move the limb causing the contingent feedback from the mobile while avoiding irrelevant motor responses. Contrary to this long-held belief, others have argued that such differentiation ability is not fully developed early in life. In the current study, we revisited the traditional mobile paradigm with a contemporary research approach (using high-precision motion capture techniques, a yoked-control design, and a large sample size) to investigate whether response differentiation ability emerges before 5 months of age. The data collected from 76 infants (aged between 115 and 159 days) revealed that infants can learn sensorimotor contingencies by increasing the movement of the connected leg relative to their baseline level. However, they did not differentially increase the movement of the leg causing an effect in the environment compared with that of other limbs. Our results illustrate that response differentiation ability emerges later than previously suggested.
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Affiliation(s)
- Umay Sen
- Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
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3
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Muscle power differences between upper and lower limbs in adolescent athletes: an approach of expert researchers. SPORT SCIENCES FOR HEALTH 2022. [DOI: 10.1007/s11332-022-00928-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/18/2022]
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4
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Effects of pitch and musical sounds on body-representations when moving with sound. Sci Rep 2022; 12:2676. [PMID: 35177677 PMCID: PMC8854572 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-06210-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/22/2021] [Accepted: 01/25/2022] [Indexed: 01/04/2023] Open
Abstract
The effects of music on bodily movement and feelings, such as when people are dancing or engaged in physical activity, are well-documented—people may move in response to the sound cues, feel powerful, less tired. How sounds and bodily movements relate to create such effects? Here we deconstruct the problem and investigate how different auditory features affect people’s body-representation and feelings even when paired with the same movement. In three experiments, participants executed a simple arm raise synchronised with changing pitch in simple tones (Experiment 1), rich musical sounds (Experiment 2) and within different frequency ranges (Experiment 3), while we recorded indirect and direct measures on their movement, body-representations and feelings. Changes in pitch influenced people’s general emotional state as well as the various bodily dimensions investigated—movement, proprioceptive awareness and feelings about one’s body and movement. Adding harmonic content amplified the differences between ascending and descending sounds, while shifting the absolute frequency range had a general effect on movement amplitude, bodily feelings and emotional state. These results provide new insights in the role of auditory and musical features in dance and exercise, and have implications for the design of sound-based applications supporting movement expression, physical activity, or rehabilitation.
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5
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Shen G, Weiss SM, Meltzoff AN, Allison ON, Marshall PJ. Exploring developmental changes in infant anticipation and perceptual processing: EEG responses to tactile stimulation. INFANCY 2021; 27:97-114. [PMID: 34617671 DOI: 10.1111/infa.12438] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/20/2020] [Revised: 07/12/2021] [Accepted: 08/29/2021] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
There is an increasing interest in alpha-range rhythms in the electroencephalogram (EEG) in relation to perceptual and attentional processes. The infant mu rhythm has been extensively studied in the context of linkages between action observation and action production in infancy, but less is known about the mu rhythm in relation to cross-modal processes involving somatosensation. We investigated differences in mu responses to cued vibrotactile stimulation of the hand in two age groups of infants: From 6 to 7 months and 13 to 14 months. We were also interested in anticipatory neural responses in the alpha frequency range prior to tactile stimulation. Tactile stimulation of infants' left or right hand was preceded by an audiovisual cue signaling which hand would be stimulated. In response to the tactile stimulus, infants demonstrated significant mu desynchronization over the central areas contralateral to the hand stimulated, with higher mu peak frequency and greater contralateral mu desynchronization for older infants. Prior to the tactile stimulus, both age groups showed significant bilateral alpha desynchronization over frontocentral sites, which may be indicative of generalized anticipation of an upcoming stimulus. The findings highlight the potential of examining the sensorimotor mu rhythm in the context of infant attentional development.
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Affiliation(s)
- Guannan Shen
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Staci M Weiss
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
| | - Andrew N Meltzoff
- Institute for Learning and Brain Science, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA
| | - Olivia N Allison
- Department of Radiology, Children's Hospital of Philadephia, Philadephia, USA
| | - Peter J Marshall
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
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6
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de Klerk CCJM, Filippetti ML, Rigato S. The development of body representations: an associative learning account. Proc Biol Sci 2021; 288:20210070. [PMID: 33906399 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2021.0070] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Representing one's own body is of fundamental importance to interact with our environment, yet little is known about how body representations develop. One account suggests that the ability to represent one's own body is present from birth and supports infants' ability to detect similarities between their own and others' bodies. However, in recent years evidence has been accumulating for alternative accounts that emphasize the role of multisensory experience obtained through acting and interacting with our own body in the development of body representations. Here, we review this evidence, and propose an integrative account that suggests that through experience, infants form multisensory associations that facilitate the development of body representations. This associative account provides a coherent explanation for previous developmental findings, and generates novel hypotheses for future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Carina C J M de Klerk
- Centre for Brain Science, Department of Psychology, University of Essex, Colchester, UK
| | | | - Silvia Rigato
- Centre for Brain Science, Department of Psychology, University of Essex, Colchester, UK
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7
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Importance of body representations in social-cognitive development: New insights from infant brain science. PROGRESS IN BRAIN RESEARCH 2020; 254:25-48. [PMID: 32859291 DOI: 10.1016/bs.pbr.2020.07.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/04/2022]
Abstract
There is significant interest in the ways the human body, both one's own and that of others, is represented in the human brain. In this chapter we focus on body representations in infancy and synthesize relevant findings from both infant cognitive neuroscience and behavioral experiments. We review six experiments in infant neuroscience that have used novel EEG and MEG methods to explore infant neural body maps. We then consider results from behavioral studies of social imitation and examine what they contribute to our understanding of infant body representations at a psychological level. Finally, we interweave both neuroscience and behavioral lines of research to ground new theoretical claims about early infant social cognition. We propose, based on the evidence, that young infants can represent the bodily acts of others and their own bodily acts in commensurate terms. Infants initially recognize correspondences between self and other-they perceive that others are "like me" in terms of bodies and bodily actions. This capacity for registering and using self-other equivalence mappings has far-reaching implications for mechanisms of developmental change. Infants can learn about the affordances and powers of their own body by watching adults' actions and their causal consequences. Reciprocally, infants can enrich their understanding of other people's internal states by taking into account the way they themselves feel when they perform similar acts. The faces, bodies, and matching actions of people are imbued with unique meaning because they can be mapped to the infant's own body and behavior.
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8
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Chinn LK, Noonan CF, Lockman JJ. The Human Face Becomes Mapped as a Sensorimotor Reaching Space During the First Year. Child Dev 2020; 92:760-773. [PMID: 32730689 DOI: 10.1111/cdev.13405] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
Although recent behavioral and neural research indicates that infants represent the body's structure, how they engage self-representations for action is little understood. This study addressed how the human face becomes a reaching space. Infants (N = 24; 2-11 months) were tested longitudinally approximately every 3 weeks on their ability to reach to a vibrating target placed at different locations on the face. Successful reaches required coordinating skin- and body-based codes for location, a problem known as tactile remapping. Findings suggest that a functional representation of the face is initially fragmented. Infants localized targets in the perioral region before other areas (ears/temples). Additionally, infants predominantly reached ipsilaterally to targets. Collectively, the findings illuminate how the face becomes an integrated sensorimotor space for self-reaching.
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9
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Shen G, Meltzoff AN, Weiss SM, Marshall PJ. Body representation in infants: Categorical boundaries of body parts as assessed by somatosensory mismatch negativity. Dev Cogn Neurosci 2020; 44:100795. [PMID: 32716850 PMCID: PMC7303979 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2020.100795] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/19/2019] [Revised: 04/10/2020] [Accepted: 05/05/2020] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
There is growing interest in developing and using novel measures to assess how the body is represented in human infancy. Various lines of evidence with adults and older children show that tactile perception is modulated by a high-level representation of the body. For instance, the distance between two points of tactile stimulation is perceived as being greater when these points cross a joint boundary than when they are within a body part, suggesting that the representation of the body is structured with joints acting as categorical boundaries between body parts. Investigating the developmental origins of this categorical effect has been constrained by infants’ inability to verbally report on the properties of tactile stimulation. Here we made novel use of an infant brain measure, the somatosensory mismatch negativity (sMMN), to explore categorical aspects of tactile body processing in infants aged 6–7 months. Amplitude of the sMMN elicited by tactile stimuli across the wrist boundary was significantly greater than for stimuli of equal distance that were within the boundary, suggesting a categorical effect in body processing in infants. We suggest that an early-appearing, structured representation of the body into ‘parts’ may play a role in mapping correspondences between self and other.
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Affiliation(s)
- Guannan Shen
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, 1701 N. 13th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19122, USA.
| | - Andrew N Meltzoff
- Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, USA
| | - Staci M Weiss
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, 1701 N. 13th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19122, USA
| | - Peter J Marshall
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, 1701 N. 13th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19122, USA
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10
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Jacquey L, Fagard J, O’Regan K, Esseily R. Développement du savoir-faire corporel durant la première année de vie du bébé. ENFANCE 2020. [DOI: 10.3917/enf2.202.0175] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/14/2022]
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11
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Jacquey L, Baldassarre G, Santucci VG, O’Regan JK. Sensorimotor Contingencies as a Key Drive of Development: From Babies to Robots. Front Neurorobot 2019; 13:98. [PMID: 31866848 PMCID: PMC6904889 DOI: 10.3389/fnbot.2019.00098] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/19/2019] [Accepted: 11/06/2019] [Indexed: 01/22/2023] Open
Abstract
Much current work in robotics focuses on the development of robots capable of autonomous unsupervised learning. An essential prerequisite for such learning to be possible is that the agent should be sensitive to the link between its actions and the consequences of its actions, called sensorimotor contingencies. This sensitivity, and more particularly its role as a key drive of development, has been widely studied by developmental psychologists. However, the results of these studies may not necessarily be accessible or intelligible to roboticians. In this paper, we review the main experimental data demonstrating the role of sensitivity to sensorimotor contingencies in infants' acquisition of four fundamental motor and cognitive abilities: body knowledge, memory, generalization, and goal-directedness. We relate this data from developmental psychology to work in robotics, highlighting the links between these two domains of research. In the last part of the article we present a blueprint architecture demonstrating how exploitation of sensitivity to sensorimotor contingencies, combined with the notion of "goal," allows an agent to develop new sensorimotor skills. This architecture can be used to guide the design of specific computational models, and also to possibly envisage new empirical experiments.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lisa Jacquey
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, UMR 8002, CNRS, Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
- Laboratoire Ethologie Cognition Développement, Université Paris Nanterre, Nanterre, France
| | - Gianluca Baldassarre
- Laboratory of Computational Embodied Neuroscience, Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Rome, Italy
| | - Vieri Giuliano Santucci
- Laboratory of Computational Embodied Neuroscience, Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Rome, Italy
| | - J. Kevin O’Regan
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, UMR 8002, CNRS, Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
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12
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Jacquey L, Popescu ST, Vergne J, Fagard J, Esseily R, O'Regan K. Development of body knowledge as measured by arm differentiation in infants: From global to local? BRITISH JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY 2019; 38:108-124. [PMID: 31705684 PMCID: PMC7065080 DOI: 10.1111/bjdp.12309] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/18/2019] [Revised: 10/04/2019] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
The ability to sense and use the body parts in an organized and differentiated manner is a precursor of body knowledge in infancy. To acquire this ability, the infant's brain might explore the perceptual consequences of its bodily actions. Undifferentiated body movements would gradually be replaced by more precise actions. Only a very few studies have tested this ‘global‐to‐local’ hypothesis, and none of them have so far been replicated. In this study, we assessed arm differentiation in 4‐, 6‐, and 8‐month‐old infants using a new contingency detection task in which infants have to detect a contingency between one of their arms’ activity and an audiovisual stimulus on a screen. We found that 4‐ to 8‐month‐old infants seem to be able to use their arms in a differentiated manner. However, surprisingly, we were not able to show a developmental trend in arm differentiation between 4 and 8 months of age. Statement of contribution What is already known on this subject? Foetuses and infants possess coarse control of their body and may be sensitive to sensory feedback caused by their own movements. Body knowledge might develop during the first year of life in what can be called a ‘global‐to‐local’ manner. Nevertheless, the precise age at which infants come to possess well‐differentiated local body knowledge requires further investigation.
What the present study adds?4‐ to 8‐month‐old infants seem able to use their arms in a differentiated manner when exposed to an audiovisual stimulation contingent on movements of one of their arms. However, we found no developmental trend in arm differentiation between 4 and 8 months of age. We hypothesize that infants' sensitivity to sensorimotor contingencies and their ability to narrow down contingencies to a specific limb might evolve with age as a function of the infant's current sensorimotor interests.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lisa Jacquey
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS, Université Paris Descartes, France.,Laboratoire Ethologie Cognition Développement, Université Paris Nanterre, France
| | - Sergiu Tcaci Popescu
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS, Université Paris Descartes, France
| | - Judith Vergne
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS, Université Paris Descartes, France
| | - Jacqueline Fagard
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS, Université Paris Descartes, France
| | - Rana Esseily
- Laboratoire Ethologie Cognition Développement, Université Paris Nanterre, France
| | - Kevin O'Regan
- Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center, CNRS, Université Paris Descartes, France
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13
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Miyazaki M, Asai T, Mugitani R. Touching! An Augmented Reality System for Unveiling Face Topography in Very Young Children. Front Hum Neurosci 2019; 13:189. [PMID: 31244628 PMCID: PMC6579857 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2019.00189] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/02/2019] [Accepted: 05/22/2019] [Indexed: 11/22/2022] Open
Abstract
Developmental body topography, particularly of the face, is a fundamental research topic in the current decade. However, empirical investigation of this topic for very young children faces a number of difficulties related to the task requirements and technical procedures. In this study, we developed a new task to study the spatially-sensed position of facial parts in a self-face recognition task for 2.5- and 3.5-year-old children. Using the technique of augmented reality (AR) and 3D face tracking technology, we presented participants with their projected self-image on a screen, accompanied by a digital mark located on parts of their face. We prepared a cheerful visual and auditory reward on the screen when participants showed correct localization of the mark. We then tested whether they could indicate the position of the mark on their own faces and remain motivated for task repetition. To assess the efficacy of this task, 31 2.5- and 11 3.5-year-old children participated in this study. About half of the 2.5-year-olds and 80% of the 3.5-year-olds could perform more than 30 trials. Our new task, then, was to maintain young children’s motivation for task repetition using the cheerful visual and auditory reward. The analysis of localization errors suggested the uniqueness of spatial knowledge of self-face in young children. The efficacy of this new task for studying the development of body image has been confirmed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michiko Miyazaki
- Department of Social Information Studies, Otsuma Women's University, Tokyo, Japan.,NTT Communication Science Laboratories, Atsugi, Japan
| | - Tomohisa Asai
- Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR), Kyoto, Japan
| | - Ryoko Mugitani
- NTT Communication Science Laboratories, Atsugi, Japan.,The Faculty of Integrated Arts and Social Sciences, Japan Women's University, Kanagawa, Japan
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14
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Schürmann T, Mohler BJ, Peters J, Beckerle P. How Cognitive Models of Human Body Experience Might Push Robotics. Front Neurorobot 2019; 13:14. [PMID: 31031614 PMCID: PMC6470381 DOI: 10.3389/fnbot.2019.00014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/30/2018] [Accepted: 03/21/2019] [Indexed: 01/08/2023] Open
Abstract
In the last decades, cognitive models of multisensory integration in human beings have been developed and applied to model human body experience. Recent research indicates that Bayesian and connectionist models might push developments in various branches of robotics: assistive robotic devices might adapt to their human users aiming at increased device embodiment, e.g., in prosthetics, and humanoid robots could be endowed with human-like capabilities regarding their surrounding space, e.g., by keeping safe or socially appropriate distances to other agents. In this perspective paper, we review cognitive models that aim to approximate the process of human sensorimotor behavior generation, discuss their challenges and potentials in robotics, and give an overview of existing approaches. While model accuracy is still subject to improvement, human-inspired cognitive models support the understanding of how the modulating factors of human body experience are blended. Implementing the resulting insights in adaptive and learning control algorithms could help to taylor assistive devices to their user's individual body experience. Humanoid robots who develop their own body schema could consider this body knowledge in control and learn to optimize their physical interaction with humans and their environment. Cognitive body experience models should be improved in accuracy and online capabilities to achieve these ambitious goals, which would foster human-centered directions in various fields of robotics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tim Schürmann
- Work and Engineering Psychology Research Group, Human Sciences, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Darmstadt, Germany
| | | | - Jan Peters
- Intelligent Autonomous Systems Group, Department of Computer Science, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Darmstadt, Germany.,Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, Tübingen, Germany
| | - Philipp Beckerle
- Elastic Lightweight Robotics, Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, Robotics Research Institute, Technische Universität Dortmund, Dortmund, Germany.,Institute for Mechatronic Systems, Mechanical Engineering, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Darmstadt, Germany
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15
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Chinn LK, Hoffmann M, Leed JE, Lockman JJ. Reaching with one arm to the other: Coordinating touch, proprioception, and action during infancy. J Exp Child Psychol 2019; 183:19-32. [PMID: 30851626 DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2019.01.014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 39] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/24/2018] [Revised: 01/18/2019] [Accepted: 01/18/2019] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
Reaching to target locations on the body has been studied little despite its importance for adaptive behaviors such as feeding, grooming, and indicating a source of discomfort. This behavior requires multisensory integration given that it involves coordination of touch, proprioception, and sometimes vision as well as action. Here we examined the origins of this skill by investigating how infants begin to localize targets on the body and the motor strategies by which they do so. Infants (7-21 months of age) were prompted to reach to a vibrating target placed at five arm/hand locations (elbow, crook of elbow, forearm, palm, and top of hand) one by one. To manually localize the target, infants needed to reach with one arm to the other. Results suggest that coordination increases with age in the strategies that infants used to localize body targets. Most infants showed bimanual coordination and usually moved the target arm toward the reaching arm to assist reaching. Furthermore, intersensory coordination increased with age. Simultaneous movements of the two arms increased with age, as did coordination between vision and reaching. The results provide new information about the development of multisensory integration during tactile localization and how such integration is linked to action.
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Affiliation(s)
- L K Chinn
- Department of Psychology, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118, USA
| | - M Hoffmann
- Department of Cybernetics, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague, 160 00 Prague 6, Czech Republic
| | - J E Leed
- Department of Psychology, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118, USA
| | - J J Lockman
- Department of Psychology, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118, USA.
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16
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Drew AR, Meltzoff AN, Marshall PJ. Interpersonal Influences on Body Representations in the Infant Brain. Front Psychol 2018; 9:2601. [PMID: 30622494 PMCID: PMC6308796 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02601] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/31/2018] [Accepted: 12/04/2018] [Indexed: 12/02/2022] Open
Abstract
Within cognitive neuroscience, there is burgeoning interest in how the body is represented in the adult brain. However, there are large gaps in the understanding of neural body representations from a developmental perspective. Of particular interest are the interconnections between somatosensation and vision, specifically infants’ abilities to register correspondences between their own bodies and the bodies of others. Such registration may play an important role in social learning and in engendering feelings of connectedness with others. In the current study, we further explored the interpersonal aspects of neural body representations by examining whether responses to tactile stimulation in 7-month-old infants are influenced by viewing another’s body. During EEG recording, infants (N= 60) observed a live presentation of an experimenter’s hand or foot being touched. During the presentation of touch to the adult’s hand or foot, the infant received a brief tactile touch to their right hand or right foot. This resulted in four conditions: (i) receive hand stimulation/observe hand stimulation, (ii) receive hand stimulation/observe foot stimulation, (iii) receive foot stimulation/observe hand stimulation, and (iv) receive foot stimulation/observe foot stimulation. Analyses compared responses overlying hand and foot regions when the observed limb matched the stimulated limb (congruent) and did not match (incongruent). In line with prior work, tactile stimulation elicited a somatotopic pattern of results in the somatosensory evoked potential (SEP) and the sensorimotor mu rhythm (6–9 Hz). Cross-modal influences were observed in the beta rhythm (11–13 Hz) response and in the late potential of the SEP response (400–600 ms). Beta desynchronization was greater for congruent compared to incongruent conditions. Additionally, tactile stimulation to the foot elicited larger mean amplitudes for congruent compared to incongruent conditions. The opposite was true for stimulation to the hand. This set of novel findings suggests the importance of considering cross-modal effects in the study of neural body representations in the infant brain. Continued work in this new area of infant neuroscience research can inform how interpersonal aspects of body representations may serve to undergird early social learning.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ashley R Drew
- Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - Andrew N Meltzoff
- Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States
| | - Peter J Marshall
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA, United States
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17
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DiMercurio A, Connell JP, Clark M, Corbetta D. A Naturalistic Observation of Spontaneous Touches to the Body and Environment in the First 2 Months of Life. Front Psychol 2018; 9:2613. [PMID: 30619012 PMCID: PMC6305473 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02613] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/08/2018] [Accepted: 12/05/2018] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
Self-generated touches to the body or supporting surface are considered important contributors to the emergence of an early sense of the body and self in infancy. Both are critical for the formation of later goal-directed actions. Very few studies have examined in detail the development of these early spontaneous touches during the first months of life. In this study, we followed weekly four infants in two naturalistic 5-min sessions (baseline and toys-in-view) as they laid alert in supine from the age of 3 weeks until they acquired head control. We found that throughout the 2 months of observation, infants engaged in a high rate of touch and spent about 50% of the time moving their hands from one touch location to the next. On most sessions, they produced up to 200 body/surface contacts and touched as many as 18 different areas (mainly upper body and floor) both hands combined. When we did not consider the specific areas touched, the rates of touches were higher to the body than to the floor, but the duration of contacts and the most touched areas were higher for the supporting surface than for the body. Until the age of 9 weeks, we found no consistent differences in the rate of touch between head and trunk. Infants also did not display significant differences in their rate of touch between right and left hand or between conditions. However, we discovered that in the earlier weeks, infants engaged more often in what we called “complex touches.” Complex touches were touches performed across several body/floor areas in one continuous bout while the hand maintained contact with the body or floor. Single touches, in contrast, corresponded to one touch to one single body or floor area at a time. We suggest that infants are active explorers of their own body and peripersonal space from day 1 and that these early self-generated and deeply embodied sensorimotor experiences form the critical foundation from which future behaviors develop.
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Affiliation(s)
- Abigail DiMercurio
- Department of Psychology, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Knoxville, TN, United States
| | - John P Connell
- Department of Psychology, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Knoxville, TN, United States
| | - Matthew Clark
- Department of Psychology, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Knoxville, TN, United States
| | - Daniela Corbetta
- Department of Psychology, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Knoxville, TN, United States
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18
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Weiss SM, Meltzoff AN, Marshall PJ. Neural measures of anticipatory bodily attention in children: Relations with executive function. Dev Cogn Neurosci 2018; 34:148-158. [PMID: 30448644 PMCID: PMC6969295 DOI: 10.1016/j.dcn.2018.08.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/05/2018] [Revised: 08/20/2018] [Accepted: 08/21/2018] [Indexed: 12/26/2022] Open
Abstract
The ability to selectively direct attention to a certain location or modality is a key neurocognitive skill. One important facet of selective attention is anticipation, a foundational biological construct that bridges basic perceptual processes and higher-order cognition. The current study focuses on the neural correlates of bodily anticipation in 6- to 8-year-old children using a task involving tactile stimulation. Electroencephalographic (EEG) activity over sensorimotor cortex was measured after a visual cue directed children to monitor their right or left hand in anticipation of tactile stimulation. Prior to delivery of the tactile stimulus, a regionally-specific desynchronization of the alpha-range mu rhythm occurred over central electrode sites (C3/C4) contralateral to the cue direction. The magnitude of anticipatory mu rhythm desynchronization was associated with children's performance on two executive function tasks (Flanker and Card Sort). We suggest that anticipatory mu desynchronization has utility as a specific neural marker of attention focusing in young children, which in turn may be implicated in the development of executive function.
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Affiliation(s)
- Staci Meredith Weiss
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, 1701 N. 13th Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19122, USA.
| | - Andrew N Meltzoff
- Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Box 357988, Seattle, WA 98195,USA
| | - Peter J Marshall
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, 1701 N. 13th Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19122, USA
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19
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Meltzoff AN, Saby JN, Marshall PJ. Neural representations of the body in 60-day-old human infants. Dev Sci 2018; 22:e12698. [PMID: 29938877 DOI: 10.1111/desc.12698] [Citation(s) in RCA: 59] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/30/2018] [Revised: 04/23/2018] [Accepted: 05/15/2018] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Abstract
The organization of body representations in the adult brain has been well documented. Little is understood about this aspect of brain organization in human infancy. The current study employed electroencephalography (EEG) with 60-day-old infants to test the distribution of brain responses to tactile stimulation of three different body parts: hand, foot, and lip. Analyses focused on a prominent positive response occurring at 150-200 ms in the somatosensory evoked potential at central and parietal electrode sites. The results show differential electrophysiological signatures for touch of these three body parts. Stimulation of the left hand was associated with greater positive amplitude over the lateral central region contralateral to the side stimulated. Left foot stimulation was associated with greater positivity over the midline parietal site. Stimulation of the midline of the upper lip was associated with a strong bilateral response over the central region. These findings provide new insights into the neural representation of the body in infancy and shed light on research and theories about the involvement of somatosensory cortex in infant imitation and social perception.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrew N Meltzoff
- Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington
| | - Joni N Saby
- Department of Radiology, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
| | - Peter J Marshall
- Department of Psychology, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
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20
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Fagard J, Esseily R, Jacquey L, O'Regan K, Somogyi E. Fetal Origin of Sensorimotor Behavior. Front Neurorobot 2018; 12:23. [PMID: 29875649 PMCID: PMC5974044 DOI: 10.3389/fnbot.2018.00023] [Citation(s) in RCA: 35] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/21/2017] [Accepted: 05/03/2018] [Indexed: 02/05/2023] Open
Abstract
The aim of this article is to track the fetal origin of infants' sensorimotor behavior. We consider development as the self-organizing emergence of complex forms from spontaneously generated activity, governed by the innate capacity to detect and memorize the consequences of spontaneous activity (contingencies), and constrained by the sensory and motor maturation of the body. In support of this view, we show how observations on fetuses and also several fetal experiments suggest that the fetus's first motor activity allows it to feel the space around it and to feel its body and the consequences of its movements on its body. This primitive motor babbling gives way progressively to sensorimotor behavior which already possesses most of the characteristics of infants' later behavior: repetition of actions leading to sensations, intentionality, some motor control and oriented reactions to sensory stimulation. In this way the fetus can start developing a body map and acquiring knowledge of its limited physical and social environment.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jaqueline Fagard
- Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (UMR 8242), CNRS-Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
| | - Rana Esseily
- EA 3456-Laboratoire Éthologie Cognition Développement (LECD), Université Paris Ouest Nanterre, Nanterre, France
| | - Lisa Jacquey
- Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (UMR 8242), CNRS-Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
| | - Kevin O'Regan
- Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (UMR 8242), CNRS-Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
| | - Eszter Somogyi
- Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception (UMR 8242), CNRS-Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
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