Semantic activation in action planning.
Four experiments investigated activation of semantic information in action preparation. Participants either prepared to grasp and use an object (e.g., to drink from a cup) or to lift a finger in association with the object's position following a go/no-go lexical-decision task. Word stimuli were consistent to the action goals of the object use (Experiment 1) or to the finger lifting (Experiment 2). Movement onset times yielded a double dissociation of consistency effects between action preparation and word processing. This effect was also present for semantic categorizations (Experiment 3), but disappeared when introducing a letter identification task (Experiment 4). In sum, our findings indicate that action semantics are activated selectively in accordance with the specific action intention of an actor.
Lindemann
Oliver
O
Nijmegen Institute for Cognition and Information, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, Netherlands. o.lindemann@nici.ru.nl
Stenneken
Prisca
P
van Schie
Hein T
HT
Bekkering
Harold
H
D000704:Analysis of Variance; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006225:Hand / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D033182:Intention; D008297:Male; D008960:Models, Psychological; D009426:Netherlands; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time; D012660:Semantics; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology