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Using abstract concepts is a hallmark of human cognition. While multiple kinds of abstract concepts exist, they so far have been conceived as a unitary kind in opposition to concrete ones. Here, we focus on Institutional concepts, like justice or norm, investigating their fine-grained differences with respect to other kinds of abstract and concrete concepts, and exploring whether their representation varies according to individual proficiency. Specifically, we asked experts and non-experts in the legal field to evaluate four kinds of concepts (i.e., institutional, theoretical, food, artefact) on 16 dimensions: abstractness-concreteness; imageability; contextual availability; familiarity; age of acquisition; modality of acquisition; social valence; social metacognition; arousal; valence; interoception; metacognition; perceptual modality strength; body-object interaction; mouth and hand involvement. Results showed that Institutional concepts rely more than other categories on linguistic/social and inner experiences and are primarily characterized by positive valence. In addition, a more subtle characterization of the institutional domain emerged: Pure-institutional concepts (e.g., parliament) were perceived as more similar to technical tools, while Meta-institutional concepts (e.g., validity) were characterized mainly by abstract components. Importantly, for what concerns individual proficiency, we found that the level of expertise affects conceptual representation. Only law-experts associated Institutional concepts with exteroceptive and emotional experiences, showing also a more grounded and situated representation of the two types of institutional concepts. Overall, our finding highlights the richness and flexibility of abstract concepts and suggests that they differ in the degree of embodiment and grounding. Implications of the results for current theories of conceptual representation and social institutions are discussed., (© 2021. The Author(s).)

The Simon effect refers to the fact that, even though stimulus position is task-irrelevant, responses to a task-relevant stimulus dimension are faster and more accurate when the stimulus and response spatially correspond than when they do not. Although the Simon effect is a very robust phenomenon, it is modulated by practice or transfer from previous tasks. Practice refers to the modulation of the Simon effect as a function of number of trials. Transfer refers to the modulation of the Simon effect as a function of preceding tasks. The aim of the present study is to disentangle the role of practice and transfer in modulating the Simon effect and to investigate whether such modulation can be extended to a different response modality. Three experiments were conducted, which included three sessions: the Baseline session, the Inducer session and the Diagnostic session. The task performed in the Baseline and the Diagnostic sessions were comprised of location-irrelevant trials (i.e., they were Simon tasks). The task performed in the Inducer session required performing location-relevant trials (i.e., it was a spatial compatibility task with a compatible or an incompatible stimulus-response mapping). In the first and third experiments, participants were required to respond manually in all sessions. In the second experiment, the task performed in the Inducer session required manual response, while in the Baseline and Diagnostic sessions the tasks required ocular response. Results showed a reduced-Diagnostic Simon effect after both compatible and incompatible mapping in the Inducer session, regardless of whether response modality was the same or different. These results support the notion that the practice effect prevails over the transfer effect., (© 2020. The Author(s).)

The Simon effect, that is the advantage of the spatial correspondence between stimulus and response locations when stimulus location is task irrelevant, occurs even when the task is performed by two participants, each performing a go/no-go task. This effect, known as the joint Simon effect, does not emerge when participants sit outside each other's peripersonal space, thus suggesting that the presence of an active confederate in peripersonal space might provide a reference for response coding. The present study investigated whether this finding is due to the distance separating the participants and/or to the distance separating each participant and the other agent's response. In two experiments, pairs of participants performed a social detection task sitting outside each other's arm reach, with response keys located close to the participants or outside arm reach. When the response key was located outside the participant's arm reach, he/she could reach it by means of a tool. In Experiment 1, by means of a tool, participants could reach their response key only, while in Experiment 2, they could reach also their co-agent's response key. The joint Simon effect did not emerge when participants could not reach the co-actor's response, while it emerged when they could potentially reach the other participant's response using the tool, but only when turn taking was required. These results may be taken as evidence that the possibility to reach and act upon the co-actor's response key may be at the bases of compatibility effects observed in joint action contexts requiring complementary responses.

The handle-to-hand correspondence effect consists of faster and more accurate responses when the responding hand is aligned with the handle side of an object tool, compared to when they lay on opposite sides. This effect has been attributed to the activation of affordances. Recent studies, however, claimed that it may depend on the spatial coding of the object on the basis of its visual asymmetry (location-coding account). Affordances are namely direct and meaningful relations between recognized objects and the observers' action system. Therefore, any manipulation that disrupts the body structure of object tools could potentially affect their identification and prevent the activation of affordances. The present study investigated the nature of the handle-to-hand correspondence effects by manipulating structural asymmetry and visual salience of object tools, while preserving their integrity that is, leaving unaltered the original possibilities to activate grasping affordances. Three experiments were run. Results were consistent with the location-coding account and claim for accurate control of visual asymmetries in object stimuli during investigation of affordance effects.

The handle-to-hand correspondence effect refers to faster and more accurate responses when the responding hand is aligned with the graspable part of an object tool, compared to when they lay on opposite sides. We performed four behavioral experiments to investigate whether this effect depends on the activation of grasping affordances (affordance activation account) or is to be traced back to a Simon effect, resulting from the spatial coding of stimuli and responses and from their dimensional overlap (location coding account). We manipulated the availability of a response alternative by requiring participants to perform either a unimanual go/no-go task (absence of a response alternative) or a joint go/no-go task (available response alternative) and the type of response required (button-press or grasping response). We found no handle-to-hand correspondence effect in the individual go/no-go task either when a button-press (Experiment 1A) or a grasping (Experiment 2A) response was required, whereas a significant effect emerged in the joint go/no-go task, irrespective of response modality (Experiments1B and 2B). These results do not support the idea that complex motor affordances are activated for meaningful objects, but are rather consistent with the more parsimonious location coding account.

Is somebody going to hurt us? We draw back. The present study investigates using behavioral measures the interplay between imitative and complementary actions activated while observing female/male hands performing different actions. Female and male participants were required to discriminate the gender of biologically and artificially colored hands that displayed both individual (grasping) and social (giving and punching) actions. Biological hands evoked automatic imitation, while hands of different gender activated complementary mechanisms. Furthermore, responses reflected gender stereotypes: giving actions were more associated to females, punching actions to males. Results have implications for studies on social stereotyping, and for research on action observation, showing that the mirror neuron system resonates in both an imitative and complementary fashion.