Mirror neuron system and
dissociation
The purpose of this section
is to give a hypothesis that formation of personalities in the individual with
DID can be related to some type of disruption of the mirror neuron system.
There has been an explosion
of the studies related to mirror neuron for the past decades. Mirror neuron was
discovered in 1996 by Italian neurophysiologists in the University of Parma,
lead by Giacomo Rizzolatti, Leonardo Fogassi, and Vittorio Gallese. They found that some
neurons in the ventral premotor cortex of the macaque monkey responded when
the monkey observed a person picking up food, the same neurons that are
activated when monkeys do the same behaviors. By definition, A mirror
neuron is a neuron that gets activated both when an animal acts and
observes the same action by another, thus "mirroring" the other’s behaviors
of the other, as though the observer itself is acting. Reportedly, mirror
neurons have been found in human, primate species, and
birds.
Iacoboni indicates that mirror
neurons forms a system of neurons (Mirror neuron System) with its relationship
to various locations in the brain, suggesting that it allows the subject to differentiate
between self and others, active and passive voice and fantasy and imagination. What
is to be stressed is that we acquire these distinctions through imitative activities.
Iacoboni, M.(2009) Mirroring
People: The New Science of How We Connect with Others. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Mirror neuron and imitation
There are studies indicating that
MNS is closely related to imitation. Among primates, there are species which
are good at imitation (orangutans) and not so good (chimpanzees). Human beings
are extremely good at imitating others and that is considered to be related to
our highly elaborated and sophisticated social and communication skills.
Let us do some thought experiment. When A smiles at B. B has an experience
of being smiled at. A’s experience of smiling at and B’s being smiled are
different and independent. However, B who is smiled at might by A might smile back
at A. That interaction is bi-directional and therefore not a simple imitation.
In the mind of B, being smiled at and smiling back are a pair of experience, one
is passive and the other is active, occurring successively and are tightly
connected. Their behaviors paired up together is not by accident. Those who are
smiled at typically smile back, which is readily observable when you look at
people interacting. Smiling at someone almost automatically induce being smiled
at. It is a beautiful imitation of someone’s behavior immediately forms a basic
emotional interaction.
