Interpersonal synchronization of inferior frontal cortices tracks social interactive learning of a song by Yafeng Pan & Giacomo Novembre & Bei Song & Xianchun Li & Yi Hu instant download

Interpersonal synchronization of inferior frontal cortices tracks social interactive learning of a song by Yafeng Pan & Giacomo Novembre & Bei Song & Xianchun Li & Yi Hu instant download

ABSTRACTKeywords:Much of human learning emerges as a result of interaction with others. Yet, this interpersonal process has beenpoorly characterized from a neurophysiological perspective. This study investigated (i) whether InterpersonalSocial interactive learningInterpersonal brain synchronizationBrain Synchronization (IBS) can reliably mark social interactive learning, and specifically (ii) during what kind offNIRS hyperscanninginteractive behavior. We recorded brain activity from learner-instructor dyads using functional Near-InfraredMusicSpectroscopy (fNIRS) during the acquisition of a music song. We made four fundamental observations. First,Turn-takingduring the interactive learning task, brain activity recorded from the bilateral Inferior Frontal Cortex (IFC) synInferior frontal cortexchronized across the learner and the instructor. Second, such IBS was observed in particular when the learner wasInvolvement theoryobserving the instructor's vocal behavior and when the learning experience entailed a turn-taking and more activemode of interaction. Third, this specific enhancement of IBS predicted learner's behavioral performance. Fourth,Granger causality analyses further disclosed that the signal recorded from the instructor's brain better predictedthat recorded from the learner's brain than vice versa. Together, these results indicate that social interactivelearning can be neurophysiologically characterized in terms of IBS. Furthermore, they suggest that the learner'sinvolvement in the learning experience, alongside the instructor's modeling, are key factors driving the alignmentof neural processes across learner and instructor. Such alignment impacts upon the real-time acquisition of newinformation and eventually upon the learning (behavioral) performance. Hence, besides providing a biologicalcharacterization of social interactive learning, our results hold relevance for clinical and pedagogic