Human groups differ not only in the types of tools and artifacts they produce, but also in the ways in which they interact with and behave around each other. Social learning is key to explaining these differences between human groups. However, to date, research on cultural transmission has focused predominately on how imitation and other forms of social learning enable children to learn about the physical world. While this research has yielded important insights into the nature of the cultural transmission process, the picture it provides is incomplete. Here, inspired by anthropological perspectives, we adopt a broader view of culture and emphasize that a group’s culture is not only composed of the tools and artifacts it produces but also the values, norms, attitudes, opinions and beliefs that it holds dear. Using this broader definition of culture, we review the social psychological literature on how children learn about the social world through copying those around them. We hope this integrative review highlights the importance of the more social aspects of cultural transmission and offers a broader view of human culture that will open up new avenues for future research.

A range of behavioural and neuroimaging evidence demonstrates that we mirror observed human action in our motor systems to a greater extent than similar non-biological movement. This chapter reviews such evidence, considering the form and kinematic features of observed stimuli to which mirror mechanisms are sensitive. It subsequently considers the role of this biological tuning in our interactions with, and processing of, humans relative to inanimate devices, in the context of functions likely to be supported by mirror mechanisms. It notes that in contrast with common assumptions, biological tuning is unlikely to reflect increased inferential processing about mental states of observed humans. It considers that biological tuning is more likely to influence our imitation and perception of human and inanimate movements. The final section examines how biological tuning can be integrated with evidence that mirror mechanisms are part of a wider domain-general system adapted for action control, mapping motor codes onto observed events from both our social and inanimate environments.

Expertise in the motor domain is something we recognize almost instantaneously in other people, whether a gymnast performing a double layout with a twist, a basketball player slam dunking the ball, a Super-G skier descending a steep course at 80 mph, or a dancer executing 11 consecutive spins on one leg without stopping. While we might be able to readily recognize expertise in others, the degree to which action experts can coordinate or move their bodies in profoundly different ways to non-experts raises intriguing questions for those interested in shared representations between self and other in our social world. Namely, how does an observer’s ability to embody an action impact how she perceives that action, and how might perception change as further experience with the observed action is acquired? In this chapter, we address these questions by considering empirical research that explores the relationship between an actor and an observer’s motor abilities, and how expertise impacts this relationship.

In many social settings, people are expected to respond to and anticipate the actions of others. Everyday examples include team sports, card games and normal conversations. Clearly, an important aspect of social cognition is thinking about and planning for other agents’ actions. But what processes are involved in thinking about others’ actions, as opposed to one’s own actions? This chapter introduces some broad ideas about the possible sensorimotor foundations of action representation in both self and other, drawing on recent findings from the fields of cognitive psychology and cognitive neuroscience. The chapter is organized around three themes: (1) how action experience shapes the representation of others’ actions; (2) action affordances and the representation of space in relation to self and other; and (3) distinguishing self and other.

A key challenge in the study of the social brain resides not only in determining how psychological states and processes map onto patterns of brain activity but also how this activity is modulated by shared representations, social compositions and social behaviors. The past 20 years have seen the growth of neuroimaging methods for studying neural aspects of shared representations, embodied cognition and the social brain in normal, waking humans. We discuss the intimate relationship between theory and methods; we discuss a set of considerations to guide the interpretation or understanding of data from neuroimaging studies; and we discuss the importance of using converging methods to dissect the social brain.

Evidence from cognitive psychology and neuroscience has been accumulated suggesting that perception and execution of action are tightly linked. The observation of an action leads to a direct activation of the corresponding motor representation in the observer, suggesting that perception and action rely on a ‘shared representational system’. Moreover, the observation of an action can lead to automatic imitation. However, if perception and action can lead to the concurrent activation of different motor plans, a fundamental problem is how we are able to distinguish between motor representations that have been internally generated by our own intention and those that have been triggered by observing others’ actions. In other words, how can we avoid automatic imitation? In the present chapter, we will report recent evidence suggesting that a crucial component of such shared representation systems is self–other distinction and that the control of shared representations involves brain areas that constitute key nodes in high-level socio-cognitive processes such as agency attribution, perspective taking and mentalizing.

Musical ensemble performance constitutes a refined form of joint action that involves the non-verbal communication of information about musical structure and expressive intentions via co-performers’ sounds and body movements. Successful musical communication requires co-performers to coordinate their actions across multiple musical dimensions (pitch and rhythm), timescales (expressive micro-timing versus large-scale tempo changes), sensory modalities (auditory and visual) and modes of interaction (unison versus complementary action). From a psychological perspective, ensemble performance necessitates precise yet flexible interpersonal coordination at the level of sensorimotor, cognitive, emotional and social processes. The current chapter addresses how such interpersonal coordination is facilitated by representations of shared performance goals, which are consolidated during preparation for joint musical performance. During actual performance, these shared goal representations interact with online sensorimotor and cognitive processes that allow co-performers to anticipate, attend and adapt to each other’s actions in real time. Studies employing behavioral and brain methods provide evidence for three functional characteristics of shared musical representations. First, shared representations involve the integration of information related to one’s own part, others’ parts and the joint action outcome, while maintaining a distinction between self and other. Second, self, other and joint action outcomes are represented in predictive internal models. Third, internal models recruit the motor system to simulate self- and other-produced actions at multiple hierarchical levels. Shared musical representations thus facilitate exquisite real-time interpersonal coordination by dynamically embodying intended action outcomes related to the self, others and the ensemble as a whole.

The human ability to predict and interpret others’ intentions is crucial to social life. The purpose of this chapter is to consider the proposition that intentions can be understood from observing others’ movements. To this end, we first focus on experimental evidence showing that individual, social and communicative intentions ‘shape’ movement kinematics. Next, we review recent work suggesting that during action observation humans are capable of picking up intention information and using it to predict others’ behavior. In the third section, we address the neural mechanisms that mediate the ability to read intention from movement observation. Based on preliminary data, we argue that mirror neuron areas are sensitive to intention information conveyed by movement kinematics. Finally, we discuss the hypothesis that a deficit in this ability might account for the difficulties in social interaction reported in autism spectrum disorders.

Music production and perception and human social understanding are linked in many ways. Producing and enjoying music appears unique to humans, and debate surrounds the topic of music’s function, especially in relation to its evolutionary origins. Here, we discuss links between music and sociality, and how insights from the unique fields of music neuroscience and social neuroscience can be combined to understand this relationship.

This chapter will begin with a focus on a particular subtopic within the shared representations research domain: imitation. Imitation occurs when the perception of another’s actions causes the activation of the corresponding motor representation in the observer. Thus imitation relates to shared representations in that it concerns the activation of a self-related representation by an other-related representation. In this chapter, I will use examples from the autism spectrum conditions (ASCs) literature to argue that if either the self- or other-related representation is atypical this can result in atypical imitation. In other words, if action observation or action execution mechanisms are atypical, then imitation will be affected. I will conclude this chapter by drawing on research that extends this logic to other sociocognitive domains such as empathy and to conditions such as schizophrenia and alexithymia.

Three main views of the primate motor cortex have been proposed over the 140 years of its study. These views are not necessarily incompatible. In the homunculus view, the motor cortex functions as a rough map of the body’s musculature. In the population-code view, populations of broadly-tuned neurons combine to specify hand direction or some other parameter of movement. In the recently proposed action map view, common actions in the movement repertoire are emphasized in different regions of cortex. In the action map view, to fully understand the organization of the motor cortex, it is necessary to study the structure and complexity of the movement repertoire and understand how that statistical structure is mapped onto the cortical surface. This chapter discusses the action map in the primate brain and how some of the complex actions represented there may play a role in social behavior.

Shared representations and coordinated action, in both team sports and for individuals with specific roles, have a big impact on performance outcomes in a wide range of sporting domains. Within team sports, perceptual and decision-making issues are key; performers must both see things in similar ways and make similar or mutually compatible decisions if appropriate action is to be taken and performance optimised. To do this, an athlete must interpret perceptual information effectively, applying an implicit ‘weighting scale’ to determine the pertinence of key factors. Such a commonality of perception across a team allows the formation of a shared mental model (SMM) through a process of both time-pressured and deliberate thinking and action, along with appropriate feedback. As individuals, referees and match officials must apply a consistent weighting scale to both formal decision making (i.e. applying the rules of the game) and more informal game management. The implementation of SMMs has been shown to increase consistency and coherence in leading referees, with shared representations resulting from both training and more ‘natural’ processes. Selection panels have also demonstrated substantial and rapid improvements in coherence, through exposing and agreeing operational definitions of key criteria, developing common weighting scales, monitoring and regular feedback. Such shared representations also carry benefits for support personnel within interdisciplinary teams and for team cultures; common features in high performance sport. It is clear that socially based or developed shared representations are crucial to effective performance in sport, and the various examples considered here offer considerable potential for future research.