The importance of the «others»: The effect of the relational context on the motor system | L'importanza degli «altri»: Come il contesto relazionale influenza il sistema motorio

According to the embodied cognition approach, language and action are strictly interwoven. In the present study we aim to investigate whether and how the motor system activation is modulated by the comprehension of «relational» sentences. The stimuli used describe a social context: indeed, they take into account the self, another agent and an emotionally connoted object (e.g. «The objects is attractive, bring it to you/give it to another person»). Crucially, results suggested that the motor simulation is influenced by both the emotional properties of the linguistically described object and the social characteristics of the referential context in which linguistically described are framed.