Unconscious processing of body actions primes subsequent action perception but not motor execution.

Abstract

Previous studies have shown that viewing body actions primes not only the visual perception of congruent versus incongruent actions, but also their motor execution. Here, we used a masked-priming paradigm to explore whether visuoperceptual and visuomotor action priming may also occur when the prime is not consciously perceived. In 5 experiments, healthy individuals were presented with masked implied-action primes and were then prompted to perceive congruent or incongruent implied-action stimuli or to execute congruent or incongruent finger movements. Results showed that implied-action primes affected subsequent action perception also when they were not consciously perceived. Unconscious visuoperceptual action priming effects were independent from spatial compatibility and reflected genuine action representation. Conversely, masked implied-action primes affected motor preparation and execution processes only when they were consciously perceived. The results provide evidence of unconscious visuoperceptual but not visuomotor action priming effects, suggesting that unconscious processing of actions affects perceptual, but not motor representations.

Reaction time indices of automatic imitation measure imitative response tendencies

“…To answer the first question, whether RT-AI is an automatic process, it has to be investigated whether it is a fast process and whether it requires intention, attention, and awareness (Moors & De Houwer, 2006). As summarized in , research has shown that RT-AI is a relatively transitory process (Catmur & Heyes, 2011), that persists in the absence of attention (Catmur, 2016;, and requires no intention to imitate (Heyes, 2011), but does require awareness of at least the stimuli (Mele, Mattiassi, & Urgesi, 2014). This indicates that RT-AI is automatic with respect to manybut not allaspects of automaticity, meriting its qualification as an automatic process (Cracco, Bardi, et al, 2018;Heyes, 2011).…”

Automatic facial reactions to facial, body, and vocal expressions: A stimulus‐response compatibility study

“…Second, differences were found between other related paradigms. For example, automatic imitation of hand movements, that is thought to be related to facial SRC, was abolished by subliminal presentation (Mele, Mattiassi, & Urgesi, 2014). This contrasts with findings in mimicry studies showing that mimicry can occur even when stimuli are presented outside of conscious awareness (Dimberg et al., 2000; Kaiser et al., 2016; Tamietto et al., 2009).…”

Overt orienting of spatial attention and corticospinal excitability during action observation are unrelated

“…The results showed that, even if the action viewed in peripheral vision—and then covertly attended—was effective in modulating the excitability of motor pathways, the accuracy of the motor response was low and rough. Along this line, other researchers adopted subliminal presentation of implied action images, demonstrating that the perceptual awareness of the action stimuli is required for motor resonance to occur ([36]; see also [37] for a behavioral demonstration). Schuch and colleagues [30] in an EEG study investigated the mu rhythm (oscillatory activity over sensorimotor cortex) and reported stronger activations of the motor system—as revealed by mu rhythm suppression—when an observed grasping action was relevant to the observers’ task (i.e., when they were later judging the grasp than when judging a colour change).…”