Brain Advance Access originally published online on May 11, 2009
Brain 2009 132(7):1989-1992; doi:10.1093/brain/awp061
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© The Author (2009). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Guarantors of Brain. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org
Book Review |
Another way to understand
University of Dusseldorf
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
The two dominating views emanating from the early studies on the motor system developed from two opposite angles. The sensory motor perspective dating back to Descartes (1664
) envisioned movements as the result of sensory stimuli. This view was later supported by the neurophysiology of reflexes operating at different levels of complexity (Jackson, 1931).
The ideomotor theory originating from psychology (Lotze, 1852; James, 1890) took the opposite motor–sensory perspective regarding volition and intention as the major source of actions. Voluntary actions were considered in terms of their behavioural goals and the percepts they generate. But there is a voluntary automatic dissociation since the way this is accomplished by motor commands remains subconscious: the ongoing execution processes are automatically adjusted.
The concepts of common coding (Prinz, 1990) and of motor imagery (Jeannerod, 1994, 1997) broadened the theoretical framework by recognizing the pivotal role of commensurate