Maria Alessandra Umiltà

• Professor
• University of Parma

Previous research has shown that organic food labeling may lead consumers to biased processing of their preferences, the physiological mechanisms behind this phenomenon are not understood. For the first time, this manuscript combines consumer valuation and physiological measures to investigate the explicit and implicit preference dimensions of orga...

Childhood maltreatment (CM) deeply impacts victims’ social competences. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect that CM duration exerts on victims’ affective and social development testing three different impact trajectories (i.e., linear, logarithmic and quadratic) and its physiological (facial mimicry and autonomic regulation o...

Several studies demonstrated that explicit forms of negation processing (e.g., “I don’t know”) recruits motor inhibitory mechanisms. However, whether this is also true for implicit negation, in which the negative meaning is implicated but not explicitly lexicalized in the sentence (e.g., “I ignore”), has never been studied before. Two Go/No-Go stud...

Embodied music cognition predicts that our understanding of human-made sounds relates to our experience of making the same or similar movements and sounds, which involves imitation of the source of visual and auditory information. This embodiment of sound may lead to numerous kinetic cross-modal correspondences (CMCs). This article investigates mus...

Although many studies have investigated spectators' cinematic experience, only a few of them explored the neurophysiological correlates of the sense of presence evoked by the spatial characteristics of audio delivery devices. Nevertheless, nowadays both the industrial and the consumer markets have been saturated by some forms of spatial audio forma...

Nowadays there is a broad consensus on the role of multimodality in the construction of an embodied aesthetic experience in adults, whereas little is known about the relationship between sensorimotor and aesthetic experience during development. To fill this gap, the present study investigated whether sensorimotor experience with sculpting natural m...

A classical theoretical frame to interpret motor reactions to emotional stimuli is that such stimuli, particularly those threat-related, are processed preferentially, i.e., they are capable of capturing and grabbing attention automatically. Research has recently challenged this view, showing that the task relevance of emotional stimuli is crucial t...

In this chapter, the authors summarize their research in the experimental aesthetics of visual art and cinema, motivated by the following assumptions: (1) vision is more complex than the mere activation of the “visual brain”; (2) our visual experience of the world is the outcome of multimodal integration processes, with the motor system as key play...

In the present essay, we summarize our research in the experimental aesthetics of visual art and cinema, motivated by the following assumptions: 1) Vision is more complex than the mere activation of the ‘visual brain’; 2) Our visual experience of the world is the outcome of multimodal integration processes, with the motor system as key player; 3) A...

Several studies demonstrated that the processing of explicit forms of negation recruits motor inhibitory mechanisms. However, whether this is also true for implicit negation, in which the negative meaning is implicated but not explicitly lexicalized in the sentence (e.g., “I ignore”), has never been studied before. This study aims to address this i...

Abstract Bodily postures are essential to correctly comprehend others' emotions and intentions. Nonetheless, very few studies focused on the pattern of eye movements implicated in the recognition of emotional body language (EBL), demonstrating significant differences in relation to different emotions. A yet unanswered question regards the presence...

The meaning of music may rely upon perceived motion (Zuckerkandl, 1971). Recently, the framework of embodied music cognition, which draws on the discovery of mirror neurons and the theory of embodied simulation (Gallese, 2007), makes the claim that our understanding of human-made sounds draws upon our experience of making the same or similar moveme...

According to embodied simulation theory, humans tacitly ‘simulate’ the actions of the other by mapping them in the sensorimotor cortex of the brain. According to the framework of embodied cinema, the meaning-making process in film is considered to be inextricably linked to the interrelation between the brain, body and environment of the viewer. Ath...

Empathy for pain involves sensory and visceromotor brain regions relevant also in the first-person pain experience. Focusing on brain activations associated to vicarious experiences of pain triggered by artistic or non-artistic images, the present study aims to investigate common and distinct brain activation patterns associated to these two vicari...

Empathy for pain involves sensory and visceromotor brain regions relevant also in the first-person pain experience. Focusing on brain activations associated to vicarious experiences of pain triggered by artistic or non-artistic images, the present study aims to investigate common and distinct brain activation patterns associated to these two vicari...

In the last decades, the embodied approach to cognition and language gained momentum in the scientific debate, leading to evidence in different aspects of language processing. However, while the bodily grounding of concrete concepts seems to be relatively not controversial, abstract aspects, like the negation logical operator, are still today one o...

The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically changed the nature of our social interactions. In order to understand how protective equipment and distancing measures influence the ability to comprehend others' emotions and, thus, to effectively interact with others, we carried out an online study across the Italian population during the first pandemic peak...

The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically changed the nature of our social interactions. In order to understand how protective equipment and distancing measures influence the ability to comprehend others’ emotions and, thus, to effectively interact with others, we carried out an online survey across the Italian population during the first pandemic pea...

Cardiac synchrony is a crucial component of shared experiences, considered as an objective measure of emotional processes accompanying empathic interactions. No study has investigated whether cardiac synchrony among people engaged in collective situations links to the individual emotional evaluation of the shared experience. We investigated theatri...

Studies on the lateralization of facial perception and the asymmetry of facial emotional expressions date back to the 19th century. Several left-side biases have been identified: greater expressivity of the left side of the face, a left cheek bias (i.e. a preference to display one’s left cheek), a left visual field advantage (i.e. a preference and...

Experimental aesthetics has shed light on the involvement of pre-motor areas in the perception of abstract art. However, the contribution of texture perception to aesthetic experience is still understudied. We hypothesized that digital screen-based art, despite its immateriality, might suggest potential sensorimotor stimulation. Original born-digit...

One key feature of film consists in its power to bodily engage the viewer. Previous research has suggested lens and camera movements to be among the most effective stylistic devices involved in such engagement. In an EEG experiment we assessed the role of such movements in modulating specific spectators´ neural and experiential responses, likely re...

Video clip of the Still condition (filmed with not moving camera mounted on tripod). (AVI)

(Example) of video clip of the Steadicam condition (filmed with a camera that was carried towards the table by a cameraman using a steadicam in such a way that the end frame matched that of the Zoom condition). (AVI)

(Example) of video clip of the Zoom condition (filmed via an automatic zoom (predetermined in speed and start as well as end frame)). (AVI)

Complete datasets for statistical analysis and figures, separated by frequency band and electrode location. (XLSX)

Few studies have explored the specificities of contextual modulations of the processing of facial expressions at a neuronal level. This study fills this gap by employing an original paradigm, based on a version of the filmic “Kuleshov effect”. High-density EEG was recorded while participants watched film sequences consisting of three shots: the clo...

The present study addresses a novel issue by investigating whether beholders’ sensorimotor engagement with the emotional content of works of art contributes to the formation of their objective aesthetic judgment of beauty. To this purpose, participants’ sensorimotor engagement was modulated by asking them to overtly contract the Corrugator Supercil...

Facial expressions are of major importance in understanding the mental and emotional states of others. So far, most studies on the perception and comprehension of emotions have used isolated facial expressions as stimuli; for example, photographs of actors displaying facial expressions corresponding to one of the so called ‘basic emotions.’ However...

To date, most investigations in the field of affective neuroscience mainly focused on the processing of facial expressions, overlooking the exploration of emotional body language (EBL), its capability to express our emotions notwithstanding. Few electrophysiological studies investigated the time course and the neural correlates of EBL and the integ...

One of the crucial features defining basic emotions and their prototypical facial expressions is their value for survival. Childhood traumatic experiences affect the effective recognition of facial expressions of negative emotions, normally allowing the recruitment of adequate behavioral responses to environmental threats. Specifically, anger becom...

In spite of their striking differences with real-life perception, films are perceived and understood without effort. Cognitive film theory attributes this to the system of continuity editing, a system of editing guidelines outlining the effect of different cuts and edits on spectators. A major principle in this framework is the 180° rule, a rule re...

Facial mimicry and vagal regulation represent two crucial physiological responses to oth-ers' facial expressions of emotions. Facial mimicry, defined as the automatic, rapid and congruent electromyographic activation to others' facial expressions, is implicated in empa-thy, emotional reciprocity and emotions recognition. Vagal regulation, quantifie...

Exemplificative stimulus employed in the present study derived from the Montreal Set of Facial Displays of Emotion. (AVI)

Dataset of participants’ EMG activities and RSA responses to facial expressions of emotions. (XLSX)

Very often the titles of Futurist paintings contain words denoting movement in order to satisfy their artistic poetic focused on motion and velocity. The aim of the present study is to investigate the reported dynamism and aesthetic quality of several Futurist artworks as a function of their title. Ten Futurist artworks with a movement-related word...

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0152188.].

Proactive and reactive inhibition are generally intended as mechanisms allowing the withholding or suppression of overt movements. Nonetheless, inhibition could also play a pivotal role during covert actions (i.e., potential motor acts not overtly performed, despite the activation of the motor system), such as Motor Imagery (MI). In a previous EEG...

Supplementary Materials. Additional information about distractors-related ERPs in the two experimental sessions. (DOCX)

Supplementary Figure 1. Event related potential (ERP) waveforms for cues and distractors in the two experimental sessions, plotted as voltage in μV in function of time in ms (stimulus onset: 0 ms). (A) Upper plot: group-averaged (n = 15) ERP waveforms for session A cue and distractors, superimposed across the 110 recording channels (e1–e110). Lower...

The development of the explicit recognition of facial expressions of emotions can be affected by childhood maltreatment experiences. A previous study demonstrated the existence of an explicit recognition bias for angry facial expressions among a population of adolescent Sierra Leonean street-boys exposed to high levels of maltreatment. In the prese...

Given ample evidence for shared cortical structures involved in encoding actions, whether or not subsequently executed, a still unsolved problem is the identification of neural mechanisms of motor inhibition, preventing "covert actions" as motor imagery from being performed, in spite of the activation of the motor system. The principal aims of the...

Given ample evidence for shared cortical structures involved in encoding actions, whether or not subsequently executed, a still unsolved problem is the identification of neural mechanisms of motor inhibition, preventing "covert actions" as motor imagery from being performed, in spite of the activation of the motor system. The principal aims of the...

Background: Self-disorders (SDs) have been described as a core schizophrenia spectrum vulnerability phenotype, both in classic and contemporary psychopathological literature. However, such a core phenotype has not yet been investigated adopting a trans-domain approach that combines the phenomenological and the neurophysiological levels of analysis...

Age-group membership effects on explicit emotional facial expressions recognition have been widely demonstrated. In this study we investigated whether Age-group membership could also affect implicit physiological responses, as facial mimicry and autonomic regulation, to observation of emotional facial expressions. To this aim, facial Electromyograp...

Age-group membership effects on explicit emotional facial expressions recognition have been widely demonstrated. In this study we investigated whether Age-group membership could also affect implicit physiological responses, as facial mimicry and autonomic regulation, to observation of emotional facial expressions. To this aim, facial Electromyograp...

Action execution–perception links (mirror mechanism) have been repeatedly suggested to play crucial roles in social cognition. Remarkably, the designs of most studies exploring this topic so far excluded even the simplest traces of social interaction, such as a movement of the observer toward another individual. This study introduces a new design b...

The aim of this study was to test the involvement of sensorimotor cortical circuits during the beholding of the static consequences of hand gestures devoid of any meaning.In order to verify this hypothesis we performed an EEG experiment presenting to participants images of abstract works of art with marked traces of brushstrokes. The EEG data were...

The aim of this study was to test the involvement of sensorimotor cortical circuits during the beholding of the static consequences of hand gestures devoid of any meaning.In order to verify this hypothesis we performed an EEG experiment presenting to participants images of abstract works of art with marked traces of brushstrokes. The EEG data were...

The aim of this study was to test the involvement of sensorimotor cortical circuits during the beholding of the static consequences of hand gestures devoid of any meaning.In order to verify this hypothesis we performed an EEG experiment presenting to participants images of abstract works of art with marked traces of brushstrokes. The EEG data were...

Several studies showed that in the human brain specific premotor and parietal areas are activated during the execution and observation of motor acts. The activation of this premotor-parietal network displaying the so-called Mirror Mechanism (MM) was proposed to underpin basic forms of action understanding. However, the functional properties of the...

Studies of children with atypical emotional experience demonstrate that childhood exposure to high levels of hostility and threat biases emotion perception. This study investigates emotion processing, in former child soldiers and non-combatant civilians. All participants have experienced prolonged violence exposure during childhood. The study, carr...

The posterior inner perisylvian region including the secondary somatosensory cortex (area SII) and the adjacent region of posterior insular cortex (pIC) has been implicated in haptic processing by integrating somato-motor information during hand-manipulation, both in humans and in non-human primates. However, motor-related properties during hand-ma...

The posterior inner perisylvian region including the secondary somatosensory cortex (area SII) and the adjacent region of posterior insular cortex (pIC) has been implicated in haptic processing by integrating somato-motor information during hand-manipulation, both in humans and in non-human primates. However, motor-related properties during hand-ma...

Kinematics analyses in FE advance task. (A) Maximal finger aperture (cm) during the execution of FEt and FEwt. (B) Reaching and pre-shaping time (msec) of FEt and FEwt. (C) Hand-manipulation execution time (msec) of FEt and FEwt. For each parameter, error bars indicate ± SEM (standard error of the mean), *p<.001. (TIF)

Text of supporting informaiton for Figure S1. (DOC)

Text of supporting information for Figure S2. (DOC)

Functional mapping of somato-motor properties in SII/pIC. Unfolded view of the lateral sulcus of both right and left hemispheres of MK1 (Left). Example of one coronal section (AP 9) showing the position of anatomical markers (Reference point 1–4; R1–R4) to build the unfolded map (Right). The 2D reconstruction of the upper bank of the lateral sulcus...

Kinematic analyses in Light and Dark conditions. (A) Maximal finger aperture (cm) during the execution of three different grips both in the Light and Dark conditions. (B) Reaching and pre-shaping time (msec) for three grips both in the Light and Dark conditions. (C) Hand-manipulation execution time (msec) for three grips both in Light and Dark cond...

Text of supporting information for Figure S3. (DOC)

Emotional facial expression is an important low-level mechanism contributing to the experience of empathy, thereby lying at the core of social interaction. Schizophrenia is associated with pervasive social cognitive impairments, including emotional processing of facial expressions. In this study we test a novel paradigm in order to investigate the...

One of the changes seen in Electroencephalography (EEG) data preceding human voluntary movement is a cortical potential called Readiness Potential (RP). Detection of this potential can benefit researchers in clinical neurosciences for rehabilitation of malfunctioning brain and those working on brain computer interfacing to develop a suitable mechan...

Facial expression of emotions is a powerful vehicle for communicating information about others' emotional states and it normally induces facial mimicry in the observers. The aim of this study was to investigate if early aversive experiences could interfere with emotion recognition, facial mimicry, and with the autonomic regulation of social behavio...

Background In the recent past several invasive cortical neuroprostheses have been developed. Signals recorded from the motor cortex (area MI) have been decoded and used to control computer cursors and robotic devices. Nevertheless, few attempts have been carried out to predict different grips. A Support Vector Machines (SVMs) classifier has been tr...

art and cortical motor activation: an EEG study The role of the motor system in the perception of visual art remains to be better understood. Earlier studies on the visual perception of abstract art (from Gestalt theory, as in Arnheim, 1954 and 1988, to balance preference studies as in Locher and Stappers, 2002, and more recent work by Locher et al...

The role of the motor system in the perception of visual art remains to be better understood. Earlier studies on the visual perception of abstract art (from Gestalt theory, as in Arnheim, 1954 and 1988, to balance preference studies as in Locher and Stappers, 2002, and more recent work by Locher et al., 2007; Redies, 2007, and Taylor et al., 2011),...

One of the changes seen in Electroencephalography (EEG) data preceding human voluntary movement is a cortical potential called Readiness Potential (RP). By applying Blind Source Separation algorithm based on second-order statistics called SOBI (second-order blind identification) to the whole head EEG, we showed that before the event (movement or ob...

The role of the motor system in the perception of visual art remains to be better understood. Earlier studies on the visual perception of abstract art (from Gestalt theory, as in Arnheim, 1954 and 1988, to balance preference studies as in Locher and Stappers, 2002, and more recent work by Locher et al., 2007; Redies, 2007, and Taylor et al., 2011),...

Many neurons in the monkey ventral premotor area F5 discharge selectively when the monkey grasps an object with a specific grip. Of these, the motor neurons are active only during grasping execution, whereas the visuomotor neurons also respond to object presentation. Here we assessed whether the activity of 90 task-related F5 neurons recorded from...

Multi-electrode arrays contain an increasing number of electrodes. The manual selection of good quality signals among hundreds of electrodes becomes impracticable for experimental neuroscientists. This increases the need for an automated selection of electrodes containing good quality signals. To motivate the automated selection, three experimenter...

Mirror neurons are a distinct class of neurons that discharge both during the execution of a motor act and during observation of the same or similar motor act performed by another individual. However, the extent to which mirror neurons coding a motor act with a specific goal (e.g., grasping) might also respond to the observation of a motor act havi...

Main effect of the human stimuli presentation (p<0.05 FDR-corrected, extend k>20, clusters are ordered by cortical lobes, then decreasing z coordinate), provided across the four types of actions and for each action independently. When available, functional localization is based on the anatomy toolbox (Eickhoff et al., 2005), with percentage indicat...

Experimental paradigm for participants in the fMRI experiment (details in main text). (0.43 MB MP4)

The humanoid robot WE4-RII was designed to express human emotions in order to improve human-robot interaction. We can read the emotions depicted in its gestures, yet might utilize different neural processes than those used for reading the emotions in human agents. Here, fMRI was used to assess how brain areas activated by the perception of human ba...

The main aim of the present study was to explore, by means of high-density EEG, the intensity and the temporal pattern of event-related sensory-motor alpha desynchronization (ERD) during the observation of different types of hand motor acts and gestures. In particular, we aimed to investigate whether the sensory-motor ERD would show a specific modu...

The human hand can take on a huge variety of shapes and functions, providing its owner with a powerful hammer at one time or a delicate pair of forceps at another. The universal utility of the hand is even more enhanced by the ability to amplify the function of the hand by using tools. To understand and appreciate how the human brain controls movem...