Abstract
[Purpose] Recent reports have shown that therapeutic exercise intervention using action observation activates mirror neurons (MNs) and has an effect on the motor recovery. In this study, we verified brain activities while subjects watched movies with an intent inference task. [Methods] For 10 right-handed healthy adults, cerebral blood flow and oxygen consumption were measured at rest and under four conditions: 1) action observation task, no verbal response; 2) intent inference task, no verbal response; 3) action observation task, with verbal response; and 4) intent inference task, with verbal response. [Results] The results indicate that under conditions 2 and 4 significant activations (p<0.05) of the inferior frontal cortex were noted in both hemispheres where MNs are present. [Conclusion] An intent inference task was determined to be more appropriate for MNs activation than observed action alone.
