title: A topographical organization for action representation in the human brain.
abstract: How the human brain represents distinct motor features into a unique finalized action still remains undefined. Previous models proposed the distinct features of a motor act to be hierarchically organized in separated, but functionally interconnected, cortical areas. Here, we hypothesized that distinct patterns across a wide expanse of cortex may actually subserve a topographically organized coding of different categories of actions that represents, at a higher cognitive level and independently from the distinct motor features, the action and its final aim as a whole. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging and pattern classification approaches on the neural responses of 14 right-handed individuals passively watching short movies of hand-performed tool-mediated, transitive, and meaningful intransitive actions, we were able to discriminate with a high accuracy and characterize the category-specific response patterns. Actions are distinctively coded in distributed and overlapping neural responses within an action-selective network, comprising frontal, parietal, lateral occipital and ventrotemporal regions. This functional organization, that we named action topography, subserves a higher-level and more abstract representation of finalized actions and has the capacity to provide unique representations for multiple categories of actions.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Clinical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Department of Surgery, Medical, Molecular, and Critical Area Pathology, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
authors.forename: Giacomo
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Handjaras
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Clinical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Department of Surgery, Medical, Molecular, and Critical Area Pathology, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
authors.forename: Giulio
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Bernardi
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical, Metabolic and Neural Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy.
authors.forename: Francesca
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Benuzzi
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical, Metabolic and Neural Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy.
authors.forename: Paolo F
authors.initials: PF
authors.lastname: Nichelli
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Clinical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Department of Surgery, Medical, Molecular, and Critical Area Pathology, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.|Clinical Psychology Branch, Department of Neuroscience, Pisa University Hospital, Pisa, Italy.
authors.forename: Pietro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Pietrini
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Clinical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Department of Surgery, Medical, Molecular, and Critical Area Pathology, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
authors.forename: Emiliano
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ricciardi
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006225:Hand; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008959:Models, Neurological; D009068:Movement; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology
keywords: action representation; action topography; fMRI; multivariate analysis; pattern classification