Do low imagers know more words? examining the association between mental imagery and vocabulary size

DOI: 10.1080/23273798.2026.2614588

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Yavuz, M., & Nazir, T. A. (2026). Do low imagers know more words? examining the association between mental imagery and vocabulary size. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 1–14. doi:10.1080/23273798.2026.2614588

Abstract

Mental imagery is often assumed to support vocabulary learning by enriching semantic representations, yet hybrid accounts of embodied cognition leave open the possibility that limited imagery, and the resulting reliance on verbal-analytic strategies, may ultimately support larger vocabularies. We tested whether imagery vividness predicts vocabulary knowledge and whether any relation depends on word concreteness. After collecting concreteness ratings for Vocabulary Size Test (VST) items, a separate group completed the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ) and VST. At the person level, VVIQ was not significantly correlated with total vocabulary score. However, item-level mixed-effects regression revealed a significant VVIQ×concretenessinteraction: higher imagery was associated with lower accuracy for highly concrete words. These findings suggest that vivid imagery does not confer an advantage in definition-matching tasks and may, for concrete words, subtly interfere with performance, consistent with compensatory verbal-analytic strategies in low-imagery individuals.

Authors

Melisa Yavuz2
Tatjana A. Nazir2

What This Study Is About

Researchers investigated whether people who have difficulty creating mental images—the ability to "see" pictures in the mind—might actually have a larger vocabulary. They wanted to see if people with low imagery (including those with aphantasia) compensate for their lack of mental pictures by developing stronger verbal and analytical skills.

How They Studied It

The study involved two main parts. First, a group of participants rated how "concrete" certain words were (for example, "apple" is very concrete, while "justice" is abstract). Then, a separate group of participants completed the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ) to measure how clearly they could picture things. These participants also took a Vocabulary Size Test, where they had to match words with their correct definitions. The researchers then compared how imagery strength related to vocabulary scores across different types of words.

What They Found

The researchers found that having a "mind's eye" does not necessarily give you an advantage in knowing more words. In fact, for highly concrete words (like "tweezers" or "octopus"), people with very vivid mental imagery actually performed slightly worse than those with low imagery. While there wasn't a huge difference in total vocabulary size across the whole group, people in the bottom 15% of imagery strength (those closest to aphantasia) tended to achieve higher overall vocabulary scores than those with the most vivid imagery.

What This Might Mean

This suggests that people with low imagery or aphantasia may use "linguistic shortcuts" to understand language. Instead of relying on a mental picture to remember what a word means, they might rely more on verbal logic and how words relate to each other. The study also hints that for some tasks, trying to form a mental image might actually be a distraction that slows down or interferes with processing word meanings. However, more research is needed to see if these findings hold true across different languages and larger groups of people.

One Interesting Detail

The study found that vivid imagery only seemed to interfere with performance when dealing with words that are very easy to picture; for abstract words that you can't easily "see," like "theory" or "aspect," there was no difference in performance between high and low imagers.

Do low imagers know more words? examining the association between mental imagery and vocabulary size

Abstract

Authors

Do low imagers know more words? examining the association between mental imagery and vocabulary size

Abstract

Authors

Do low imagers know more words? examining the association between mental imagery and vocabulary size

Abstract

Authors

Do low imagers know more words? examining the association between mental imagery and vocabulary size

Abstract

Authors

What This Study Is About

How They Studied It

What They Found

What This Might Mean

One Interesting Detail

What This Study Is About

How They Studied It

What They Found

What This Might Mean

One Interesting Detail

Joel Pearson

Merlin Monzel

Adam Zeman

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Martin Reuter

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Paolo Bartolomeo

Carla Dance

Jianghao Liu

Fraser Milton