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Abstract:
Theories of embodied cognition suggest strong relationships between sensorimotor and
cognitive systems. This study explored the possible effects of poststroke
changes in sensorimotor experience on conceptual knowledge about common
tools. Premorbidly right-handed patients experiencing right- or lefthand
paresis due to unilateral stroke saw pictures of graspable everyday
items that were oriented for either a right- or a left-handed grasp. They
identified verbally the type of grasp they would employ (i.e., clench or
pinch) when using each object for its typical function. Analyses of voice
onset latencies were consistent with the prediction that right-paresis (leftstroke)
patients would be faster in these manipulation judgments when
the objects were oriented to the left, whereas left-paresis (right-stroke)
patients would show the reverse pattern. The results are discussed in the
context of the body specificity hypothesis, according to which people
who interact with their physical environments in systematically different
ways form correspondingly different mental representations.
