ERP evidence of MI activation without motor response execution.
There has been controversy concerning the activity of the primary motor cortex (MI) during the mental rehearsal of movement (motor imagination). In this study we found that the lateralized readiness potential (LRP), an event-related potential probably generated in MI, appeared with similar latencies during both trials requiring execution of hand movements and trials requiring only their mental rehearsal, regardless of whether misleading pre-cues that increased latency were employed. However, LRPs obtained during imagination trials had smaller amplitudes. We conclude that MI is involved in motor imagination as well as in preparing overt movement, and that in overt movement the LRP sums neural activity common to these two situations and neural activity exclusive to overt movement.
Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology, University of Santiago de Compostela, 15705 Santiago de Compostela, Spain. sgaldo@usc.es
Santiago
S
Galdo-Alvarez
María T
MT
Carrillo-de-la-Peña
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D004569:Electroencephalography / Q000379:methods; D004576:Electromyography / Q000379:methods; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D009044:Motor Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D009068:Movement / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D011930:Reaction Time; D013997:Time Factors