Robotics in service
AFNI: software for analysis and visualization of functional magnetic resonance neuroimages
Computers and Biomedical Research
Designing Sociable Robots
2005 Special Issue: Emotion understanding from the perspective of autonomous robots research
Neural Networks - Special issue: Emotion and brain
Partially Distributed Representations of Objects and Faces in Ventral Temporal Cortex
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience
Understanding Intentions in Social Interaction: The Role of the Anterior Paracingulate Cortex
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience
Domain-Specific Knowledge Systems in the Brain: The Animate-Inanimate Distinction
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience
Two takes on the social brain: A comparison of theory of mind tasks
Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience
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We designed an fMRI experiment comparing perception of human faces and robotic faces producing emotional expressions. The purpose of our experiment was to investigate engagement of different parts of the social brain by viewing these animate and inanimate agents. Both human and robotic face expressions evoked activity in face-responsive regions in the fusiform gyrus and STS and in the putative human mirror neuron system. These results suggest that these areas mediate perception of agency, independently of whether the agents are living or not. By contrast, the human faces evoked stronger activity than did robotic faces in the medial pFC and the anterior temporal cortex-areas associated with the representation of others' mental states (theory of mind), whereas robotic faces evoked stronger activity in areas associated with perception of objects and mechanical movements. Our data demonstrate that the representation of the distinction between animate and inanimate agents involves areas that participate in attribution of mental stance.