An analysis of ideomotor action

This article presents a framework based on the work of R. H. Lotze (1852), W. James (1890), and A. G. Greenwald (1970) for understanding ideomotor act ions that tend to arise when individuals watch others perform certain actio ns. Two principles of ideomotor action induction are distinguished: percept ual induction, in which people tend to perform the movements they see, and intentional induction, in which people tend to perform movements suited to achieve what they would like to see. In 3 experiments, ideomotor hand, head , and foot movements were studied while participants watched a ball traveli ng toward a target. Results showed strong support for intentional induction , weaker support for perceptual induction, and a strong impact of the effec tor studied. The representational basis of action induction (stimulus vs. g oal representations) and the automaticity of the underlying processing (tas k-dependent vs. task-independent induction) were considered.