Giacomo Rizzolatti

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Giacomo Rizzolatti

Giacomo Rizzolatti (born April 28, 1937 in Kiev ) is an Italian neurophysiologist . He received his doctorate from the University of Padua in 1961 and completed his neurological training there three years later. Rizzolatti is now professor emeritus at the University of Parma and heads a research group on the subject of mirror neurons .

Life

Giacomo Rizzolatti is one of the most important brain researchers of our time. Since the 1980s, Rizzolatti has been researching nerve cells that control actions and are therefore called “action neurons ”. In 1992, Rizzolatti achieved a scientific breakthrough in this field with a simple experiment with monkeys. Rizzolatti demonstrated that the same neural processes take place in a monkey's brain, regardless of whether it shows its own behavior or just observes it. For this purpose, the brain waves of monkeys were measured when they find a nut and eat it or only watch through a pane of glass, as a conspecific does. In both cases, identical processes occurred in the monkey's brain. It had never before been experimentally measured and compared how a brain reacts when its own behavior is shown or only observed. Rizzolatti called the nerve cells that show the same reactions when observed as when they behaved themselves as mirror neurons . Since Rizzolatti's success, scientists from various disciplines have been researching mirror neurons around the world. Rizzolatti himself works in this field at the University of Parma to this day. Research into mirror neurons is seen in some places as an important building block in the discussion of the questions of why people are capable of empathy , behave socially and how human morality could have come about.

criticism

Subsequent research, especially in the neurosciences , has so far not provided any clues for the relationship between mirror neurons and empathy (compassion), as suggested by Rizzolatti . As part of this criticism, it was particularly emphasized that empathic behavior should not be confused with imitation behavior (cf. emotional contagion ).

Honors

Fonts (selection)

  • Giacomo Rizzolatti, Corrado Sinigaglia: Empathy and Mirror Neurons: The Biological Basis of Compassion . Frankfurt am Main .: Suhrkamp, ​​2008, ISBN 978-3-518-26011-1 . (Original title: So Quel che fai - Il cervello che agisce ei neuroni specchi. 2006, ISBN 88-6030-002-9 )
  • Giacomo Rizzolatti, Lisa Vozza: Nella mente degli altri. Neuroni specchio e comportamento sociale . Zanichelli, 2007, ISBN 978-88-08-06671-8 .

Web links

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  1. ↑ Uni Padua ( Memento of the original dated February 7, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.unipr.it
  2. ↑ In the chapter “I feel what you also feel - is it worth it to be good?” In: Richard David Precht: Who am I - and if so, how many? A philosophical journey . Goldmann, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-442-31143-9 . Rizzolatti's research is described in detail.
  3. ↑ Giacomo Rizzolatti, Corrado Sinigaglia: Empathy and Mirror Neurons: The Biological Basis of Compassion . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 2008, ISBN 978-3-518-26011-1 .
  4. ↑ Gregory Hickok: Why We Understand What Others Feel: The Myth of Mirror Neurons. Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich 2015, ISBN 978-3-446-44326-6 .
  5. ↑ I. Dinstein, C. Thomas, M. Behrmann, DJ Heeger: A mirror up to nature. In: Current biology: CB. Volume 18, number 1, January 2008, ISSN  0960-9822 , pp. R13-R18, doi : 10.1016 / j.cub.2007.11.004 , PMID 18177704 , PMC 2517574 (free full text) (review).
  6. ↑ G. Hickok: Eight problems for the mirror neuron theory of action understanding in monkeys and humans. In: Journal of cognitive neuroscience. Volume 21, number 7, July 2009, ISSN  0898-929X , pp. 1229-1243, doi : 10.1162 / jocn.2009.21189 , PMID 19199415 , PMC 2773693 (free full text) (review).
  7. ^ PB Pascolo, R. Budai, R. Rossi: Critical review of the research leading to the mirror neuron paradigm - biomed 2010. In: Biomedical sciences instrumentation. Volume 46, 2010, ISSN  0067-8856 , pp. 422-427, PMID 20467117 (review).
  8. ↑ C. Heyes: Where do mirror neurons come from? In: Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews. Volume 34, Number 4, March 2010, ISSN  1873-7528 , pp. 575-583, doi : 10.1016 / j.neubiorev.2009.11.007 , PMID 19914284 (review).
  9. ↑ V. Kosonogov: Why the Mirror Neurons Can not Support Action Understanding. In: Neurophysiology. 44, 2012, pp. 499-502, doi : 10.1007 / s11062-012-9327-4 .
  10. ↑ Gregory Hickok: Why We Understand What Others Feel: The Myth of Mirror Neurons. Translated by Elsbeth Ranke. Carl Hanser Verlag, Munich 2015, 368 pages, ISBN 3446443266 . Original: The Myth of Mirror Neurons: The Real Neuroscience of Communication and Cognition , WW Norton & Company, 2014, 288 pp. ISBN 0393244164 .
  11. ^ C Lamm, J. Majdandžić: The role of shared neural activations, mirror neurons, and morality in empathy - A critical comment. In: Neuroscience research. Volume 90C, January 2015, ISSN  1872-8111 , pp. 15-24, doi : 10.1016 / j.neures.2014.10.008 , PMID 25455743 (free full text) (review).
  12. ↑ lincei.it ( Memento of the original from July 28, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.lincei.it
  13. ↑ Premio Herlitzka
  14. ^ Giacomo Rizzolatti Associé étranger de l'Académie des sciences
  15. ^ Giacomo Rizzolatti National Academy of Sciences
  16. ^ Biography Giacomo Rizzolatti
  17. ↑ EMBO enlarges its membership for 50th anniversary. Press release from May 8, 2014 at the Science Information Service (idw-online.de)
personal data
SURNAME Rizzolatti, Giacomo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian neurophysiologist
DATE OF BIRTH April 28, 1937
PLACE OF BIRTH Kiev