Definition:
- Integration of sensory input and motor actions, underlying how organisms learn, refine, and retrieve motor behaviors in response to sensory feedback .
Mechanism
- Neural basis:
- Motor learning and sensori-motor functions are not just automatic
- Explicit strategies and cognitive involvement are vital across the lifespan, with mediation by processing speed and mobility.
- Coupling of Systems:
- Performance in sensorimotor tasks (hearing in noise, balance, walking) and cognitive tasks (working memory, inhibition, flexibility) are increasingly coupled as age advances.
- Poor sensorimotor ability may coincide with poorer cognitive performance, though domain-specific factors also matter .
- Flexible Cognitive Role:
- Sensorimotor systems are flexibly involved in object interaction, language acquisition, and the representation of both concrete and abstract concepts.
- Abstract words activate mouth-motor areas, showing language's dependence on sensori-motor processes
- Bidirectional Influence:
- Neurons with sensory properties in frontal motor circuits, and feedback from motor to sensory areas, highlight that the sensorimotor system contributes actively to cognition—not just execution of movement but interpretation, planning, and predictive mental modeling .
Anatomy
- Neural circuitry underlying action initiation and control
- Complex
- Fronto-striatal tract
- Motor subpathway → pyramidal tract
- Connection between
- SMA, lateral premotor cortex
- Head of caudate
- Fronto-astlant tract
- Connection between
- SMA
- Inferior frontal gyrus
- U fibres
- Connections between
- Precentral subcircuits
- Retrocentral subcircuits
Function
- Critical for Learning: Sensorimotor learning involves explicit reasoning (understanding action-outcome relationships), refinement (optimizing parameters to achieve goals), and retrieval (recalling suitable motor policies for context) .
Clinical significance
- Aging links: There is substantial covariation between sensory/sensorimotor ability and cognition, especially as both decline with age. This intensifies resource overlap and cross-domain competition and compensation in older adults .
- Sensorimotor cognition explains not only basic learning and adaptation but also high-level cognitive functions involved in abstract thought, decision making, and social interaction, flexibly modulated by context and experience
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