Università degli Studi di Milano
The Secret Life of Motor Representations
Résumé
Motor representations live a kind of double life. Several studies suggest that, although paradigmatically involved in performing actions, they also occur when merely observing others act and sometimes influence thoughts about the goals of observed actions. Much less studied is whether motor representations may live a further, third life when people are not alone, but together. What happens motorically when people are acting together or observing others acting together ? In this talk I shall draw on recent psychological and neuroscientific research to argue that fully explaining acting together may involve identifying a certain interagential structure of motor representations. I also explore the conjecture that this interagential structure of motor representations might be involved also in observing other people acting together, providing some preliminary supporting evidence.