Mirror neurons and embodied simulation

Given that studies of two-year-olds are relatively rare, Gallagher’s and Daum et al’s discussions of infant and child behaviour support the relevance of an embodied cognition approach to two-year-olds’ viewing behaviour. But perhaps studies (such as this one) focusing on the

academically much-neglected but crucial third year of life might also contribute to the development of theory in the field of embodied cognition.

1.4.1 Mirror neurons and embodied simulation

A research programme at the University of Parma in the 1980s found that “mirror neurons” in a macaque monkey’s brain which discharge when the monkey performs a specific action, also discharge when it hears the sound related to the action and even if it simply observes the action performed by another (di Pellegrino et al. 1992). Later research established similar functions in the human brain (e.g. Fabbri-Destro and Rizzolatti 2008). A special issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society in 2014 reviewing progress in mirror neuron research was edited by Ferrari and Rizzolatti, who discuss the “wide impact on cognitive disciplines” of these discoveries, suggesting two reasons for their significance:

The first is that their discovery put the problem of how we understand others at the forefront of neuroscience. The second is that, by showing that mirror neurons were basically motor neurons, they suggested a rather unexpected solution to this problem:

the motor system is involved in understanding the actions and intentions of others (Ferrari and Rizzolatti 2014, p1).

The mirror neuron findings thus support earlier theories of embodiment with accounts of demonstrable processes in the brain that link body and mind. In a series of papers between 2001 and 2011 Gallese, one of the Parma researchers, developed the concept of “embodied simulation”, based on the mirror neuron discoveries, to characterize the ways in which humans instinctively attempt to identify and assess other people’s emotions, intentions and actions (Gallese 2001, Gallese and Lakoff 2005, Gallese and Sinigaglia 2011). “Simulation” in this context does not mean pretence or imitation, but the process of modelling an event or activity in order to understand it better. This potentially casts new light on the ways in which all humans mimic other people’s expressions and gestures, often unconsciously: while some adults may comment on this as merely “cute” in infants and toddlers, it can more usefully be interpreted as a way of

“trying out” the feelings that the bodily phenomena are expressing, and can relate to characters on screen as well as to real people. It may thus be a significant element of children’s learning to follow narrative, when they recognize, relate to and imitate expressions, gestures and postures

of characters in movies, and sometimes also those of people watching with them (see for example Figures 3.15 and 3.16). It is particularly relevant in the study of two-year-olds, given that their linguistic fluency and ability to follow narratives are still developing. It seems possible that mirror neurons might have a particular role in movie-watching, given that the

proprioceptive dimensions of normal visual perception are not then in play; however, investigating this was beyond the scope of my research.

Understanding the principles of embodied cognition enabled an important breakthrough in how I regarded my data. I began to consider the children’s very early emotional responses to movies and their episodes of intense attentiveness as evidence of efforts to make sense of what they were watching, driven by evolved, instinctive, essential behaviours, rather than as

developmentally early stages that would later be replaced by more sophisticated cognitive processes. This perspective enabled me to better address the problems of studying children aged between 1;10 and 3.5 years, and led me into investigating the neuroscientific

underpinnings of concepts such as “evolved” and “instinctive” – terms regarded with some suspicion in cognitive and sociocultural traditions, but which can be fruitfully combined with sociocultural approaches, especially in studying children of this age.

1.4.2 Emotion

My readings in embodied cognition prompted me to explore further the emotional responses that were expressed through the children’s bodily expressions and postures, in many of the viewing events I observed and filmed. For example, my initial interest in fearful responses was based on the supposition that these indicated the children’s “mistaken” interpretations of what they were watching, such as being unaware of generic features that were supposed to signal humorous intent (see Section 4.2). But this seemed to disregard the intensity and longevity of these responses. I was intrigued to discover that Darwin’s speculations about his son (aged 2;3) when he reacted to seeing large animals in cages at the zoo, anticipated later discoveries in neuroscientific research that connect emotions to survival in early evolutionary periods:

He often said afterwards that he wished to go again, but not to see "beasts in houses";

and we could in no manner account for this fear. May we not suspect that the vague but very real fears of children, which are quite independent of experience, are the inherited effects of real dangers and abject superstitions during ancient savage times? (Darwin 1877, p288).

The neuroscientist and psychobiologist Panksepp (2004) describes emotional operating systems in the brain, making the same link, minus the judgmental note of “abject superstitions.” His

argument is based on the proposition that “all mammals possess intrinsic psychobehavioural control systems” that, from birth, enable them to start learning and to survive (Panksepp 2004, p25; see also my discussion of Trevarthen in Section 1.2.4). He focuses first on the “powerful, primal emotional circuits” which are the ones “that appear to elaborate fear, anger, seeking and sorrow.” He points out that there are many more emotional states, which we can identify through introspection, most of which are harder to research. But he argues that “the affective power of emotionality arises from subcortical systems that also sway the minds of ‘lower’

animals”. The “ancient emotional systems” in the older strata of our brains are extremely powerful because in all animals they have an essential function: “to energise and guide organisms in their interactions with the world” (Panksepp 2004, p42). This echoes Vygotsky’s claim that “action flows from bodily causes. It originates with a naturally essential force and is accomplished according to mechanical laws; its intensity contains the force of passions”

(Vygotsky 1999, p165)

However, neither Panksepp nor Vygotsky is describing a biologically deterministic model in which emotions simply “drive” thought and action, but a more complex interrelationship between the physical and the psychological. Panksepp explains how emotional systems, centrally situated in the brain, “extensively interact, in strong and weak ways, with higher and lower brain functions” – i.e. with cognitive perceptual processes, and with autonomic processes (Panksepp 2004, p44). These processes are complex, and involve feedback loops that modulate the relationships between emotion, thought and action in ways that are unpredictable and vary widely between individuals.

Cabanac, a Canadian physiologist, uses a four-dimensional map to convey the complexity of the emotional experiences themselves (Cabanac 2002, p70):

In this map, four axes intersect:

X identifies the kind of mental event present in consciousness (sensation, memory recall, etc.);

Y is a measure of its intensity (barely experienced, faint, clear, loud, intense, etc.);

Z is the amount of pleasure or displeasure experienced, from extreme displeasure (negative), to extreme pleasure (positive);

T is time and describes the duration of the mental experience.

Cabanac argues that “emotion is any mental experience with high intensity and high hedonicity (pleasure/displeasure)” (Cabanac 2002, p76) but as his model shows, within any emotional state, its intensity, hedonicity and duration may vary independently. In the case of some of the responses I was analysing, all three of these were extremely high. Cabanac’s model, unlike Panksepp’s, easily accommodates the emotion of joy, which I discuss in Section 4.4. Sloan points out (Sloan 2011) that while “joy is sometimes mentioned in discussions of hedonism, happiness, desire, or religion, it is rarely considered in itself” (p419); it differs from other emotions in being an isolated, unpredictable occurrence, defined by its intensity and transience.

A useful note of caution – as well as an implied call for further research – is provided by the American neuroscientist Damasio (2000), against the idea that we have a “biological machinery”

that is “preset” to deliver predictable emotions, cognition and behaviour. This idea has been resisted by most sociocultural scholars and is now superseded in neuroscience, as Damasio explains:

In all probability, development and culture superpose the following influences on the preset devices: first, they shape what constitutes an adequate inducer of a given emotion; second, they shape some aspects of the expression of emotions; and third, they shape the cognition and behaviour which follows the deployment of an emotion.

(Damasio 2000, p 127)

The Dutch psychologist Frijda (1986) warns that “there is no consensus about the definition of emotion; one may quarrel endlessly about the word” and suggests that we may as well assume

Figure 1.1 Cabanac's map of emotional experience

“that what we loosely call ‘emotions’ are responses to events that are important to the

individual” before going on to consider what these responses consist of (Frijda 1986). Cabanac takes a similarly pragmatic approach, starting with one of the many lists in everyday discourse:

“the term is taken for granted in itself and, most often, emotion is defined with reference to a list: anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness, and surprise.” His own definition is that emotions are

“motivational states,” all of which act to generate “behaviour oriented towards, or away from, the stimulus” (Cabanac 2002, p72). Panksepp asserts that there is “good biological evidence for seven innate emotional systems – fear, anger, sorrow, anticipatory eagerness, play, sexual lust and maternal nurturance”(Panksepp 2004, p47) – but he focuses particularly on the earliest evolutionary phases of human existence to identify four emotions that are likely to have arisen from basic environmental challenges: fear, panic, rage and seeking. He characterises “seeking”

as the emotion that drives curiosity and investigation (p50), confirming Vygotsky’s much earlier argument that “thought is … engendered by motivation, i.e., by our desires and needs, our interests and emotions” (Vygotsky 1986, p252). It is this concept in particular that I have taken up in my analysis of the focused attention that the children often displayed (see Section 4.1).