Abstract
Behavioural and functional neuroanatomy studies demonstrate that mental rotation of body parts is carried out through a sort of inner motor simulation. Here we examined whether changes of hands posture influence the mental rotation of hands and feet. Twenty healthy subjects were asked to verbally judge the laterality of hands and feet pictures in two different postural conditions. In one condition, subjects kept hands on their knees in anatomical position; in the other, their hands were kept in an unusual posture with intertwined fingers, behind the back. Results show that mental rotation of hands but not of feet was influenced by changes in hands posture. Indeed, while mental rotation of hands was faster in the front than in the back hands position, no similar effect was found when mentally rotating feet. Thus, sensory-motor and postural information coming from the body may influence mental rotation of body parts according to specific, somatotopic rules.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Alivisatos B, Petrides M, (1997) Functional activation of the human brain during mental rotation. Neuropsychologia 35(2):111–118
Berlucchi G, Aglioti SM, (1997) The body in the brain: neural bases of corporeal awareness. Trends Neurosci 20(12):560–4
Bonda E, Petrides M, Frey S, Evans A (1995). Neural correlates of mental transformation of the body-in-space. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 92:11180–11184
Briggs CG, Nebes RD (1975) Patterns of hand preference in a student population. Cortex 11:230–238
Cohen MS (1996) Changes in cortical activity during mental rotation: a mapping study using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Brain 119:89–119
Cooper LA, Shepard RN (1975) Mental transformations in the identification of left and right hands. J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform 104(1):48–56
Corballis MC, Sergent J (1989) Hemisferic specialization for mental rotation. Cortex 25(19):15–25
Decety J, Jeannerod M, Prablanc C (1989) The timing of mentally represented actions. Behav Brain Res 34:35–42
Decety J, Jeannerod M, Germain M, Pastene J (1991) Vegetative response during imagined movement is proportional to mental effort. Behav Brain Res 42:1–5
Decety J, Perani D, Jeannerod M, Bettinardi V, Tadary B, Woods RP, Mazziotta JC, Fazio F (1994) Mapping motor representations with positron emission tomography. Nature 371:600–602
Dominey P, Decety J, Broussolle E, Chazot G, Jeannerod M (1995) Motor imagery of a lateralized sequential task is asymmetrically slowed in hemi-Parkinson’s patients. Neuropsychologia 33:727–741
Fiorio M, Tinazzi M, Aglioti SM (2006) Selective impairment of hand mental rotation in patients with focal hand dystonia. Brain 129(Pt 1):47–54
Ganis G, Keenan JP, Kosslyn SM, Pascual-Leone A, (2000) Transcranical magnetic stimulation of primary motor cortex affects mental rotation. Cereb Cortex 10:175–180
Gentilucci M, Daprati E, Gangitano M, (1998) Right-handed and left-handed have different representation of their own hand. Brain Res Cogn Brain Res 6(3):185–192
Gerardin E, Sirigu A, Lehericy S, Poline JB, Gaymard B, Marsault C, Agid Y, Le Bihan D (2000) Partially overlapping neural networks for real and imagined hand movements. Cereb Cortex 10(11):1093–1104
Kosslyn SM, Di Girolamo GJ, Thompson WL, Alpert NM (1998) Mental rotation of objects versus hands: neural mechanisms revealed by positron emission tomography. Psychophysiology 35(2):151–161
Kosslyn SM, Ganis G, Thompson WL (2001) Neural foundations of imagery. Nat Rev Neurosci 2(9):635–42
Michelon P, Vettel JM, Zacks JM (2006) Lateral somatotopic organization during imagined and prepared movements. J Neurophysiol 95(2):811–22
Moseley GL (2004) Why do people with complex regional pain syndrome take longer to recognize their affected hand? Neurology 62:2182–2186
Nico D, Daprati E, Rigal F, Parsons L, Sirigu A (2004) Left and right hand recognition in upper limb amputees. Brain 127:120–132
Parsons LM (1987a) Imagined spatial transformation of one’s body. J Exp Psychol Gen 116(2):172–191
Parsons LM (1987b) Imagined spatial transformation of one’s hands and feet. Cognit Psychol 19:178–241
Parsons LM (1994) Temporal and kinematic properties of motor behavior reflected in mentally simulated action. J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform 20(4):709–730
Parsons LM, Fox PT, Downs JH, Glass T, Hirsch TB, Martin CC, Jerabek PA, Lancaster JL (1995) Use of implicit motor imagery for visual shape discrimination as revealed by PET. Nature 375(6526):54–58
Parsons LM, Gabrieli JD, Phelps EA, Gazzaniga MS (1998) Cerebrally lateralized mental representations of hands shape and movement. J Neurosci 18(16):6593–6548
Petit LS, Pegna AJ, Mayer E, Hauert CA (2003) Representation of anatomical constraints in motor imagery: mental rotation of a body segment. Brain Cogn 51(1):95–101
Porro CA, Francescato MP, Cettolo V, Diamond ME, Baraldi P, Zuiani C, Bazzocchi M, di Prampero PE (1996) Primary motor and sensory cortex activation during motor performance and motor imagery: a functional magnetic resonance imaging study. J Neurosci 16(23):7688–7698
Schwoebel J, Friedman R, Duda N, Coslett HB (2001) Pain and the body schema: evidence for peripheral effects on mental representations of movement. Brain 124:2098–2104
Sekiyama K (1982) Kinesthetic aspects of mental representations in the identification of left and right hands. Percept Psychophys 32(2):89–95
Shenton JT, Schwoebel J, Coslett HB (2004) Mental motor imagery and the body schema: evidence for proprioceptive dominance. Neurosci Lett 370:19–24
Shepard NR, Metzler J (1971) Mental rotation of three-dimensional objects. Science 171:701–703
Sirigu A, Duhamel JR (2001) Motor and visual imagery as two complementary but neurally dissociable mental processes. J Cogn Neurosci 13(7):910–919
Sirigu A, Cohen L, Duhamel JR, Pillon B, Dubois B, Agid Y, Pierrot-Deseilligny C (1995) Congruent unilateral impairments for real and imagined hand movements. NeuroReport 6:997–1001
Tabachnick BG, Fidell LS (1989) Using multivariate statistics, 2nd edn. Harper and Row, New York
Thayer ZC, Johnson BW, Corballis MC, Hamm JP (2001) Perceptual and motor mechanisms for mental rotation of human hands. NeuroReport 16:3433–3437
Wohlschlager A, Wohlschlager A (1998) Mental and manual rotation. J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform 24(2):397–412
Acknowledgments
This research was supported by Grants from the Ministero Istruzione Universita’ e Ricerca and Fondo Investimenti Ricerca di Base, Italy both awarded to SMA. We would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding authors
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Ionta, S., Fourkas, A.D., Fiorio, M. et al. The influence of hands posture on mental rotation of hands and feet. Exp Brain Res 183, 1–7 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-007-1020-2
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-007-1020-2