Through event related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), brain activity was mapped in three normal subjects while they imagined grasping a softball with their own hand. During the right-hand-movement imagery task, the dorsolateral prefrontal cortices (BAs 9, 10 and 46), the supplementary motor area (SMA), the pre motor cortex, the occipital cortices, the anterior cingulate gyrus and the cerebellum were significantly activated. Only in two subjects (YM and TK) did the present imagery task activate the right inferior parietal lobule (IPL) and the left superior temporal gyrus (STG), which are known to be involved in imagery requiring visuospatial information and in silent vocalization of the mimesis, respectively. This finding may exemplify that different imagery strategies activate different brain sites.
