When people perceive the actions of others, they do not observe the cognitive processes that gave rise to them but rather their behavioral consequences in the world. According to ideomotor theory, though, perceiving these action outcomes may activate associated cognitive motor programs in the observer that, in turn, trigger the corresponding actions. As such, ideomotor theory provides a mechanistic explanation for how perception and thoughts of action outcomes can automatically trigger behavior and may explain phenomena such as mimicry, behavior priming, and some forms of nudging.
In an article recently published in Motivation Scienceopens in new window, Ruud Custers argues that although many previous studies report evidence for ideomotor action, they do not explicitly test the automaticity of triggered actions; hence, these findings may be open to alternative explanations. Recent studies with more stringent tests suggest that such automatic triggering of actions occurs but is not necessarily a result of long-term associations between actions and outcomes in memory. Rather, people infer the causal relations between actions and outcomes in the situation at hand, and these inferences then drive automatic ideomotor action. As such, ideomotor action may be situated and shaped by the observer’s interpretation of the situation rather than based on long-term associations. This is consistent with other recent evidence suggesting that mimicry and behavior priming are not caused by hard-wired links between perception and action but that these effects are malleable and flexible. Together, this alternative explanation and its supporting evidence call for researchers to rethink their understanding of the automatic influence of observing other people’s behavior on action and may offer new opportunities for behavioral interventions.