It Takes Two to Imitate
Roland Pfister, David Dignath, Bernhard Hommel, Wilfried Kunde
Psychological Science · 2013 · Volume 24 · Issue 10
Abstract
Imitation is assumed to serve crucial functions in social interaction, such as empathy and learning, yet these functions apply only to the imitating observer. In the two experiments reported here, we revealed a distinct function of imitation for the action model: Anticipation of being imitated facilitates the production of overt motor actions. Specifically, anticipated motor responses of social counterparts serve as mental cues for the model to retrieve corresponding motor commands to orchestrate his or her own actions.
Keywords
social behavior, social interaction, motor processes
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