Mirror neurons help make meaning in communication in 3 key ways: 1) Mirror neurons fire both when we perform an action and when we observe another performing the same action, allowing us to understand others' intentions and have empathy. 2) Through mirroring others' gestures, words and actions in conversation, mirror neurons enable understanding without explicit meaning. 3) Mirror neurons are thought to have played a role in the evolution of language and culture by facilitating learning through imitation.

1. How mirror neurons
help us in
making meaning?
Presented at IMS STUTTGART
During TSM ERASMUS 2010
Konrad Juszczyk, Ph.D.
Adam Mickiewicz University
Poznań-Poland
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2. V. S. Ramachandran
I predict that mirror neurons will do for
psychology what DNA did for biology.
MNs are Necessary but not sufficient:
their emergence and further develo-
pment in hominids was a decisive step.
Research in MNs may explain the evolution
of language, learning by imitation and culture.
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3. Questions and challenges
What do we know about mirror neurons?
Why and what do we want to know about MNs?
What do we gain from having known MNs?
When and where are MNs active?
How do MNs discoveries support meaning
making and its properties in communication?
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4. Mirror neurons in monkeys
Original discovery by Parma neurologists:
Rizzolatti, Fadiga, Fogassi, Gallese since 1996...
Depth electrodes measure single-neuron
activity of macaques’ brain when they
pick up food (action)
observe a person picking up food (perception of
action).
Some neurons give similar responses,
so they are dubbed mirror neurons. 4
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5. MNs in human brain
No possibility of measuring the single-
neuron activity with depth electrodes
(excluding testing for neurosurgery).
Most evidence for human MNs is indirect.
Neurological experiments suggest that
a mirror system for gesture recognition
also exists in humans and includes
Broca’s area (Rizzolatti & Arbib 1998)
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6. PREMOTOR F5 – A44&A45
Anatomical and functional homologies are found in
monkeys’ brain – F5 human brain A44
&A45–Broca’s area
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7. What are mirror neurons?
MNs are the cells in our brain that make our
experience, mostly made of interactions with other
people, deeply meaningful.
MNs are brain cells that seem specialized in
understanding our existential condition and our
involvement with others.
MNs show we are not alone, we are
interconnected.
Iacoboni 2008
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8. PREMOTOR MIRROR
AIM
CORTEX NEURONS
MOTOR MOTOR
ACTION
CORTEX NEURONS
ACTION is a movement associated with a goal.
Initiation of the movement is accompanied by the
creation of an expectation that the goal will be met.
(Arbib and Rizolatti)
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9. Arbib’s questions
How to view a language in a way which better
defines its relation to goal-directed action?
How to link perception with perfomance?
How to explain evolution of communication?
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10. Michael Arbib claims:
Language is essentially multi-modal, not
just a set of sequences of words which
can be completely captured by marks on
the printed page.
Written language reflects the lessons of
grammar more than does spoken
language.
The language of the brain or schema
network is vastly richer than a linear
sequence of words.
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11. Mirror System Hypothesis
The Mirror System Hypothesis
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12. Mirror System Hypothesis
The mechanisms which support language in the
human brain evolved atop a basic mechanism
not originally related to communication.
Instead, the mirror system for grasping with its
capacity to generate and recognize a set of
actions, provides the evolutionary basis for
language parity – i.e., an utterance means
roughly the same for both speaker and hearer.
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13. Mirror System Hypothesis
In particular, human Broca’s area
contains a mirror system for grasping
which is homologous to the F5 mirror
system of macaque.
Arbib, M. 2006. Action to Language via
the Mirror Neuron System
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14. Mirror System Hypothesis
the mirror system for grasping
(F5 in macaques brain)
/
the motor system for gesturing
/
mechanisms which support language
(Broca’s area in human brain)
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15. MNs in DIALOGUE
We imitate each others gestures, words
and syntactic structures in conversation.
We can guess and make meaning with
the nonverbal cues seen in our partner.
We use mirror neurons to do all that!
Giving speech is more challenging
than taking part in a conversation!
Iacoboni 2008
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16. MONOLOGUE VS DIALOGUE
You can plan your
speech as a text.
You can control the
pace of your speech.
You are supposed
to give the speech.
well-formed
& coherent sentences
Iacoboni 2008
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17. MONOLOGUE VS DIALOGUE
You can plan your You take part in
speech as a text. interaction/dance.
You can control the You take turns and
pace of your speech. rely on the partner.
You are supposed You get a feedback
to give the speech. and you react to it.
well-formed fragments of sentences
& coherent sentences and guessing game
Iacoboni 2008
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18. Meaning making
Communication is about sharing:
unison: how it is similar to my partner?
attention: what do we need to do it?
How am I going to make
you think about it?
emotions: how do I feel about doing it?
intentions: what do I want you to do?
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19. Unison and synchrony
in social coordination
Rhythms of people sitting opposite each other
may synchronise if they perform the same
activity and look at each other.
Pairs of subjects move their fingers at their
own preferred frequency and amplitude with
and without vision of the other’s movements.
Brain activity was measured with dual-EEG.
Tognoli, Lagarde, DeGuzman 19
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20. The PHI complex
Spontaneous coordination in the form of
synchronized behavior was observed between
participants during visual contact even though
no instruction to coordinate was given.
Precise analysis of oscillatory components
(phi1 and phi2) may distinguish effective from
ineffective social coordination.
Tognoli, Lagarde, DeGuzman 20
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21. McNeill: One system
of gesture and language
Gestures facilitate making meaning:
retrieval of the missing word (help for the speaker)
reflection on the content of the speech (iconic type)
rhytmical organisation of speech (beat type)
MNs fire when we observe iconic gestures
because these are important in face2face
conversation (Molnar-Szakacs 2005)
Making meaning is multimodal!
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22. Gestures lead–speech follows
MNs support gestural origins of a language.
MNs are critical in lg evolution and development.
MNs respond to hierarchical organization of
the actions of other people (Molnar-Szakacs).
MNs seem to exist in Broca’s area which
suggest the imitational basis of language.
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23. If mirror neurons can code the hierarchy of
manual activities, they may also code
hierarchy in other domains, for instance, in
linguistic material.
When we humans are engaged in
conversation, we tend to imitate each other's
syntactical structures.
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24. MNs simulate the actions we observe while
watching a video or reading a sentence.
Brain activity was measured during
reading sentences about hand and mouth actions
watching movies showing hand and mouth actions
hand action: grasping and mouth action: biting
Selective activation of MNs was reported in
the areas of hand and mouth action control
respectively for hand and mouth sentences or
movies (Lakoff 2005 and Aziz Zadeh 2006)
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25. ATTENTION
Mirror neurons fire when we observe actions
and when we perform the same actions.
Observing sb’s mental state and action
activates the same brain cells and circuts
that are used to perform the same action.
Wicker, Keysers, Plailly
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26. EMOTIONS and EMPATHY
Understanding emotions of our partners
is an important skill in communication.
People experience other people’s emotions
because they can simulate them in the brain.
Empathy is not merely the consequence of
the passive observation of emotional cues
but it is subject to contextual appraisal and
modulation (similarity and familiarity).
De Vignemont & Singer The empathic brain: how, when and why?
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27. Roles of empathy
Epistemological empathy might enable us to
make faster and more accurate predictions of
other people’s needs and actions and discover
salient aspects of our environment.
Social empathy might serve as the origin
of motivation for altruistic behavior and
cooperation, hence – communication.
De Vignemont & Singer The empathic brain: how, when and why?
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28. EMOTION CONTAGION
Functional magnetic resonance imaging
(fMRI) studies have shown that observing
another person’s emotional state activates
parts of the neuronal network involved in
processing that same state in oneself, whether
it is disgust, touch or pain (several studies).
De Vignemont & Singer The empathic brain: how, when and why?
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29. INTENTIONS
Bower: Goal oriented brain cells. Neurons
may track action as a prelude to empathy
Monkeys’ premotor neurons get fired up both when
the animals perform an action, such as grasping or
manipulating an object, and when they watch an
experimenter do the same.
Observing an action helps in understanding intention.
Mirror neurons observed in monkeys may work
similarly in human brain, if we have them;)
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30. Simulation theory of
Mindreading theory
Mirror neurons appear to form a cortical
system matching observation and execution
of goal-related motor actions.
Experimental evidence suggests that a similar
matching system also exists in humans.
Other people’s mental states are represented
by adopting their perspective: by tracking or
matching their states with resonant states of
one’s own. 30
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31. Gallese and Goldman
MNs represent neural correlate of simulation
of other’s action and learning by imitation.
MNs underlie the process of ‘mind-reading’.
Mind-reading is the activity of representing
specific mental states of others, for example,
their perceptions, goals, beliefs, expectations,
and the like.
Accurate understanding and anticipation
enable the observer to adjust his responses
appropriately. (communication planning) 31
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32. EPILEPSY PATIENTS
April 2010: some mirror neurons activity
was measured in human brain with
intracranial depth electrodes.
New mirror neurons are to be found in
different than expected areas of brain.
Interpretation of data is still unclear.
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33. What is existentialism?
What is worth understanding
and knowing is our existence,
the human condition, and that
engagement and involvement are
superior to a detached stance.
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34. EXISTENSIAL NEUROSCIENCE
Iacoboni: Kierkegaard’s existentialism
maps well onto mirror neuron properties:
Kierkegaard proposed that our existence
becomes meaningful only through our
authenthic commitment to the finite and
temporal, a commitment that defines us.
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35. EXISTENSIAL NEUROSCIENCE
The neural resonance between self and
other that mirror neurons allow is in my
opinion the embodiment of such
commitment.
Our neurobiology–our mirror neurons–
commits us to others.
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36. EXISTENSIAL NEUROSCIENCE
Mirror neurons show the deepest way
we relate to and understand each other:
they demonstrate how we are wired for
empathy, which we should inspire us to
shape our society and make it a better
place to live.
Iacoboni 2008:267-268
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37. embodied cognition
Mental processes are shaped by our bodies and by
the types of perceptual and motor experiences
that are the product of their movement through
and interaction with the surrounding world.
This view is generally called embodied cognition,
and the version of this theory especially dedicated
to language is known as embodied semantics.
The discovery of mirror neurons has strongly
reinforced this hypothesis that cognition and
language are embodied.
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38. Bibliography
http://www.zotero.org/groups/
meaningmaking/items/collection/
2724947
Iacoboni, M. 2008. Mirroring People.
Arbib, M. 2006. Action to Language via
the Motor Mirror System (first chapters)
email me: juszczyk@amu.edu.pl
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