Neurocognitive mechanisms underlying action tool knowledge tasks: specificity of tool-tool compared to hand-tool compatibility tasks
Abstract Action tool knowledge can be assessed mainly with two kinds of tasks: tool-tool and hand-tool compatibility tasks. While these tasks are used to assess action tool knowledge, recent data showed striking dissociations between these tasks in brain-damaged patients. In this study, we explored...
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Nature Portfolio
2025-04-01
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| Series: | Communications Biology |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-025-07923-1 |
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| Summary: | Abstract Action tool knowledge can be assessed mainly with two kinds of tasks: tool-tool and hand-tool compatibility tasks. While these tasks are used to assess action tool knowledge, recent data showed striking dissociations between these tasks in brain-damaged patients. In this study, we explored the neuropsychological dissociations (Experiment 1; 60 brain-damaged patients) and the potential cognitive mechanisms engaged during these two tasks (Experiment 2; 52 healthy participants). Finally, we also reanalyzed fMRI data to investigate the neural bases engaged in tool-tool and hand-tool compatibility tasks (Experiment 3; 34 healthy participants). The three experiments provide convergent arguments by showing that both tasks share common core computations supported by a left-lateralized brain network, but hand-tool compatibility task engages regions outside of this brain network and is explained by visual imagery while tool-tool task is rather explained by motor imagery. Our results shed a new light on action tool knowledge tasks. |
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| ISSN: | 2399-3642 |