2-128 - Function and Development of the Mirror System in Infancy and Toddlerhood

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

This symposium brings together research from multiple perspectives to examine the function and development of the Mirror System in infancy and early childhood. The symposium includes papers that focus on two fundamental abilities that are central to adaptive human functioning: the ability to deploy actions strategically in the service of goals, and the ability to apprehend the goals of social partners in order to produce meaningful social responses. Papers to be presented include both neuro-typical infants and young children with Autism Spectrum Disorder as well as methodological advances in analytic approaches associated with the assessment of the mirror system in infants and young children. Four papers will be presented. The first paper will discuss how interaction dynamics, particularly turn-taking, influence infants’ mirroring of others’ actions. The second paper will present findings on the link between mirroring activity and communicative development with a focus on infant pointing and vocabulary development in 10- to 12-month-old infants. The third paper will present findings on mirroring in typically developing toddlers and those with ASD in communicative and non-communicative contexts. The final paper will discuss methods for assessing functional connectivity between brain regions associated with mirroring and attention process in infancy. The symposium will provide novel and unique data that will argue for a developmental approach to the links between the emergence of the mirror system and the development of social cognition.

Sub Unit

• Biological Processes: Psychophysiology

Chair

• Nathan Fox, University of Maryland

Individual Presentations

• Action mirroring in 9-month-olds: Let’s take turns! - Presenting Author: Marlene Meyer, University of Chicago; Non-Presenting Author: Haerin Chung, University of Chicago; Non-Presenting Author: Amanda Woodward, University of Chicago

• Mu Desynchronization to Observation of Gesture Mediates the Relation Between Gesture Experience and Language Development - Presenting Author: Virginia Salo, University of Maryland, College Park; Non-Presenting Author: Ranjan Debnath, University of Maryland, College Park; Non-Presenting Author: Meredith Rowe, Harvard University

• Neural Processing of Action Perception and Social Communication in Young Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders - Presenting Author: Manon A Krol, Boston University; Non-Presenting Author: Jennifer Leano, Boston University; Non-Presenting Author: Daniela Plesa-Skwerer, Boston University; Non-Presenting Author: Helen Tager-Flusberg, Boston University

• Mirroring Activity During Observation of Actions Underlies Distinct yet Functionally Connected Motor and Attention Processes - Presenting Author: Ranjan Debnath, University of Maryland, College Park; Non-Presenting Author: Virginia Salo, University of Maryland, College Park; Non-Presenting Author: George A Buzzell, University of Maryland, College Park; Non-Presenting Author: Kathryn H Yoo, University of California, Davis; Non-Presenting Author: Nathan Fox, University of Maryland