Mirror neurons and culture
Here’s some more news about mirror neurons. In a recent study, American subjects watched an American and a Nicaraguan using various hand gestures, some American, some Nicaraguan, and some meaningless. The mirror neurons of the subjects were most active when watching the American; even when the Nicaraguan was using gestures that were familiar to the Americans, the subjects didn’t respond as strongly. This indicates that our mirroring system responds to the person at least as much as it does to the gesture itself, and perhaps that we process information differently depending on whether it comes from someone in a group that we identify with or from someone in another group. This article from Science Daily has more details. I’m a little bemused by the supposedly provocative question, posed toward the top of the article, of whether culture influences the brain. How could it not? It’s interesting to learn about how it does, certainly, but it’s no big surprise to learn that it does.
