From: The mirror neuron system in post-stroke rehabilitation
Study | N | Tool | Procedure | Results | p value |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Grèzes et al.[32] | 12 | fMRI | Video recordings of objects, grasping pantomimes. | Significant activation in the left intraparietal area during object observation vs baseline. | p = 0.001 |
Montgomery et al.[33] | 14 | fMRI | Videos of communicative hand gestures, object-directed hand movements and word stimuli. | Activations in the inferior parietal lobe and frontal operculum. | p < 0.001 |
Hamilton and Grafton. [34] | 20 | fMRI | Handed participants watched twelve sets of videos presented in a pseudorandom order and pressed a key if the film was froze in the middle of the action. | A stronger response was found in regions throughout the fronto-parietal circuits, right inferior parietal lobule and right inferior frontal gyrus extending to the inferior frontal sulcus. | p < 0.001 |
Gazzola et al.[11] | 16 | fMRI | Subjects watched either a human or a robot performing various actions. All visual stimuli were video clips lasting between 2.5 and 4 s. | During motor execution active areas were: motor primary in the frontal lobe; sensitive primary and secondary the parietal lobe and the middle temporal gyrus in the temporal lobe. | p < 0.001 |
22 | fMRI | Movement of the hands with observation of the mirror reflex. | The active regions were the precuneus and the posterior cingulate cortex. | p < 0.005 | |
Tanaka and Inui. [35] | 12 | fMRI | Subjects were instructed to imitate presented postures using their right hand or fingers. | Significant activation was observed in Broca’s area. | p < 0.001 |
Heiser et al.[36] | 14 | TMS | Patients watched different videos showing a hand pressing a sequence of 2 (out of 4 possible keys) on a key-press box. | There was a selective deficit of the imitation task for rTMS over the left and right pars opercularis of the inferior frontal gyrus, compared to rTMS over the occipital cortex. | p < 0.005 |
Stefan et al.[16] | 20 | TMS | Task that encoded an elementary motor memory. | Observation of movements led to the formation of a lasting specific memory trace in movement representations that resembled that elicited by physical training. | p < 0.005 |
Oberman et al.[37] | 11 | EEG | Subjects opened and closed their right hand while watching a video of a moving hand. | Consistent pattern of suppression in the frequency band of interest. | p = 0.001 |