title: Anticipating action effects recruits audiovisual movement representations in the ventral premotor cortex.
abstract: When table tennis players anticipate the course of the ball while preparing their motor responses, they not only observe their opponents striking the ball but also listen to events such as the sound of racket-ball contact. Because visual stimuli can be detected more easily when accompanied by a sound, we assumed that complementary sensory audiovisual information would influence the anticipation of biological motion, especially when the racket-ball contact is not presented visually, but has to be inferred from continuous movement kinematics and an abrupt sound. Twenty-six observers were examined with fMRI while watching point-light displays (PLDs) of an opposing table tennis player. Their task was to anticipate the resultant ball flight. The sound was presented complementary to the veracious event or at a deviant time point in its kinematics. Results showed that participants performed best in the complementary condition. Using a region-of-interest approach, fMRI data showed that complementary audiovisual stimulation elicited higher activation in the left temporo-occipital middle temporal gyrus (MTGto), the left primary motor cortex, and the right anterior intraparietal sulcus (aIPS). Both hemispheres also revealed higher activation in the ventral premotor cortex (vPMC) and the pars opercularis of the inferior frontal gyrus (BA 44). Ranking the behavioral effect of complementary versus conflicting audiovisual information over participants revealed an association between the complementary information and higher activation in the right vPMC. We conclude that the recruitment of movement representations in the auditory and visual modalities in the vPMC can be influenced by task-relevant cross-modal audiovisual interaction.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Department of Psychology and Sport and Exercise Sciences, University of Muenster, Horstmarer Landweg 62b, 48149 Münster, Germany; Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, University of Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Straße 10 H, 35394 Giessen, Germany. Electronic address: mb.ablutis@uni-muenster.de.
authors.forename: Matthias
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bischoff
authors.affiliation: Institute of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Department of Psychology and Sport and Exercise Sciences, University of Muenster, Horstmarer Landweg 62b, 48149 Münster, Germany; Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, University of Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Straße 10 H, 35394 Giessen, Germany. Electronic address: karen.zentgraf@uni-muenster.de.
authors.forename: Karen
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Zentgraf
authors.affiliation: Institute for Sport Science, Department of Psychology and Sport Sciences, University of Giessen, Kugelberg 62, 35394 Giessen, Germany; Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, University of Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Straße 10 H, 35394 Giessen, Germany. Electronic address: Sebastian.Pilgramm@psychol.uni-giessen.de.
authors.forename: Sebastian
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Pilgramm
authors.affiliation: Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, University of Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Straße 10 H, 35394 Giessen, Germany. Electronic address: stark@bion.de.
authors.forename: Rudolf
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Stark
authors.affiliation: Institute for Sport Science, Department of Psychology and Sport Sciences, University of Giessen, Kugelberg 62, 35394 Giessen, Germany; Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, University of Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Straße 10 H, 35394 Giessen, Germany. Electronic address: Britta.Lorey@sport.uni-giessen.de.
authors.forename: Britta
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Krüger
authors.affiliation: Institute for Sport Science, Department of Psychology and Sport Sciences, University of Giessen, Kugelberg 62, 35394 Giessen, Germany. Electronic address: Joern.Munzert@sport.uni-giessen.de.
authors.forename: Jörn
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Munzert
keywords: Action effects; Anticipation; Movement representations; Multisensory research; vPMC