Actions are performed to achieve desired goals, hence, to intentionally produce particular events or effects. By definition, an action effect can be attained only after the action has been executed. Yet experimental research on action control in the last two decades has provided considerable evidence that in voluntary action, representations of action effects seem to be involved before action execution starts, i.e., anticipatory representations of action effects seem to affect the selection and/or the planning of a motor action. Action effect representations have at least two functions. Firstly, after having executed a particular action, we need to compare the attained effects with the intended effects. Hence, anticipatory effect representations are involved in the
evaluation of action results. Secondly, we plan and execute actions in a way that they are likely to produce the desired effects. Hence, anticipations of action goals are involved in
action control. Both functions require the presence of a representation of an action goal that controls the selection and execution of given motor patterns. According to this reasoning, voluntary actions are controlled by some anticipatory representations that capture their intended and expected effects. This idea is usually referred to as the
ideomotor approach to action control. Whereas the evaluative function plays a central role in all closed-loop theories of motor control and has been investigated in numerous experiments, empirical research on the ideomotor approach has been missing for a long time. This is surprising, since the theoretical roots of this approach go back to the beginning of the 19th century, and in 1890, James formulated his ideomotor principle (James,
1890). …
