Numerous studies explore consumer perception of brands in a more or less passive way. This may still be representative for many situations or decisions we make each day. Nevertheless, sometimes we often actively search for and use information to make informed and reasoned choices, thus implying a rational and thinking consumer. Researchers suggested describing this distinction as low relative t...

Since before we can remember, humanity aims to overcome its biological limitations; such a goal has certainly played a key role in the advent of technique. However, despite the benefits that technique may bring, the people who make use of it will inevitably be under risk of harm. Even though human technical wisdom consists in attaining the best result without compromising anybody’s safety, misu...

Studies investigating joint actions have suggested a central role for the putative mirror neuron system (pMNS) because of the close link between perception and action provided by these brain regions [1], [2], [3]. In contrast, our previous functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiment demonstrated that the BOLD response of the pMNS does not suggest that it directly integrates observed...

The exact contribution of Broca's area to motor cognition is still controversial. Here we used repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (5 Hz, five pulses) to interfere transiently with the function of left BA44 in 13 healthy individuals; the task consisted of reordering human actions or nonbiological events based on three pictures presented on a computer screen and extracted from a video s...

Some neuroimaging studies have reported activation by imitation in the left Brodmann area 44 (BA 44), a part of Broca's area considered to be a neural substrate for speech production. However, in these previous studies the subjects were required to perform the same movements repeatedly so that the experimental stimuli could be viewed as cues when to do the given movements rather than a specific...

In this study we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine differences in recruited brain regions during the concentric and the eccentric phase of an imagined maximum resistance training task of the elbow flexors in healthy young subjects. The results showed that during the eccentric phase, pre-frontal cortex (BA44) bilaterally was recruited when contrasted to the concentric ...

Watching someone scratch himself can induce feelings of itchiness in the perceiver. This provides a unique opportunity to characterize the neural basis of subjective experiences of itch, independent of changes in peripheral inputs. In this study, we first established that the social contagion of itch is essentially a normative response (experienced by most people), and that the degree of contag...