The Constituents of Action Representation Evoked When Identifying Manipulable Objects
Date
2014-05-08
Authors
Lin, Yu-Tang Terry
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Abstract
We examined the effects of keeping hand actions in working memory on the speed of naming handled objects. The features of the hand action and objects’ handle matched or mismatched on two dimensions: alignment (left vs. right), orientation (horizontal vs. vertical). For objects presented in their canonical upright position, the speed of naming was only slower when the actions were partially incongruent with the target object. For rotated objects, the effect was reversed. The pattern of results suggests that the identification system is more sensitive to the functional goal (i.e. the end state) of the rotated object in evoking action representations than the actions evoked by the depicted view (i.e. the beginning state). The findings, overall, strongly support the notion that action representations play a functional role in object identification.
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Keywords
action representation, object identification, theory of event coding