Another, top-down Another, top-down technique capable
of stimulating motor areas is action observation[28]. Here,
the trainee has to watch carefully pre-recorded or actually
performed movements and thereafter to imitate them. It
has been demonstrated that the mere observation of
motor actions performed by an actor activates the
corresponding motor representations in the brain of an
observer[62]. Although the positive effects of motor
observations on the learning of behaviors have been
known for a decade[63], the neurorehabilitative use of this
approach is quire recent. The theoretical frame for this
therapeutic approach lies in the discovery of the so called
mirror neurons and their functional abilities