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Neonatal imitation and an epigenetic account of mirror neuron development

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 April 2014

Elizabeth A. Simpson ,
Nathan A. Fox ,
Antonella Tramacere  and
Pier F. Ferrari
Elizabeth A. Simpson
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Biologia Evolutiva e Funzionale, Università di Parma, 43100 Parma, Italy. a.tramacere@gmail.compierfrancesco.ferrari@unipr.ithttp://mirroringdevelopment.uchicago.edu/project_3/people.shtmlhttp://www.unipr.it/arpa/mirror/english/staff/ferrarip.htm Laboratory of Comparative Ethology, Animal Center, The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, Dickerson, MD 20842. simpsonea@mail.nih.gov
Nathan A. Fox
Affiliation:
Department of Human Development and Quantitative Methodology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742-1131. fox@umd.eduhttp://education.umd.edu/EDHD/faculty/Fox/
Antonella Tramacere
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Biologia Evolutiva e Funzionale, Università di Parma, 43100 Parma, Italy. a.tramacere@gmail.compierfrancesco.ferrari@unipr.ithttp://mirroringdevelopment.uchicago.edu/project_3/people.shtmlhttp://www.unipr.it/arpa/mirror/english/staff/ferrarip.htm
Pier F. Ferrari
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Biologia Evolutiva e Funzionale, Università di Parma, 43100 Parma, Italy. a.tramacere@gmail.compierfrancesco.ferrari@unipr.ithttp://mirroringdevelopment.uchicago.edu/project_3/people.shtmlhttp://www.unipr.it/arpa/mirror/english/staff/ferrarip.htm
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Abstract

Neonatal imitation should not exclusively be considered at the population-level; instead, we propose that inconsistent findings regarding its occurrence result from important individual differences in imitative responses. We also highlight what we consider to be a false dichotomy of genetic versus learning accounts of the development of mirror neurons, and instead suggest a more parsimonious epigenetic perspective.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 37 , Issue 2 , April 2014 , pp. 220
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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