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    • The observed link between neural mirroring and cooperation

    2018-11-07

    The observed link between neural mirroring and cooperation was evident for beta power (16–20Hz). For mu power (7–12Hz), however, no indication for such a relation was found. Previous research has shown that both mu and beta power are modulated during action observation, although they have been associated with slightly different functions (Caetano et al., 2007; Meyer et al., 2011; Quandt and Marshall, 2014; Schuch et al., 2010). Mu-band activity is suggested to be involved in translating sensory input into motor processes (Naeem et al., 2012; Pineda, 2005; Vanderwert et al., 2013), which matches with its more posterior localization over sensorimotor regions of the endothelin receptor antagonists (Ritter et al., 2009). In contrast, the location of beta oscillatory activity is typically more anterior and it is associated with activity in the motor and premotor cortex (Ritter et al., 2009). It has been suggested that both mu- and beta-band oscillations are involved in action predictions (Southgate et al., 2009; Stapel et al., 2010), while beta-band activity is associated specifically with prediction updating and error monitoring (Arnal et al., 2011; Koelewijn et al., 2008). Exactly these processes – monitoring others’ actions and integrating information in order to update action predictions – are important during cooperation (Kourtis et al., 2013; Sebanz et al., 2006). Updating action predictions and monitoring were essential for the current peer cooperation task. Predicting which tube the partner would choose, monitoring the partner’s behavior to check whether the prediction was correct, and updating one’s predictions were necessary to succeed on the task. This might also explain why a relation between cooperation performance and oscillatory modulation was observed in the beta-band, as continuous prediction and updating of predictions are inherent to action observation (Falck-Ytter et al., 2006; Gredebäck and Melinder, 2010; Kilner et al., 2007). Still, the exact functional differences between mu- and beta-band oscillations and their respective roles during action observation have to be determined in future research. For both mu- and beta-power, we observed that power values were higher during action observation than baseline indicating enhancement rather than suppression. At first sight, this is surprising since previous research suggests that suppression of mu- and beta-power indicate increased involvement of the motor system (Marshall and Meltzoff, 2011; Rizzolatti and Fogassi, 2014). However, several recent studies also found that power in these frequency bands is not significantly suppressed during action observation (Cannon et al., 2016; Nyström, 2008; Perry and Bentin, 2010) or even enhanced (Marshall et al., 2013). Although in our study the neural response showed an unexpected directionality with regard to baseline, we are confident that the mu- and beta-band activity reflects a response of the motor system for two reasons. First, the effect was relatively confined to electrode sites overlaying over motor areas (C3, C4), which suggests a modulation of the motor system. Second, children were asked to sit motionless and watch three repetitions of each action video on the screen before they were allowed to respond. Thus, children likely tried to actively inhibit an overt motor response during the action observation, and this was associated with an increase in beta-power (Gilbertson et al., 2005). Notably, this motor inhibition did not affect the direction of the relation we found. That is, less beta power with respect to baseline (indicating relatively more motor activity) was related to more success during peer cooperation. Although children thus likely suppressed their motor activity in general to sit as motionless as possible, interindividual differences with respect to how sensitive their motor system was to action observation were still related to their cooperation behavior. To test whether inhibition indeed plays a role, myelin sheath is important to structurally investigate this in future studies by including a condition without any instruction in which children observe exactly the same actions.