In 1880, Sir Francis Galton was the first to describe a condition where individuals were unable to create mental images. This condition, aphantasia, has many different definitions including as a total congenital absence of visual imagery. There is debate about whether it is a visual processing impairment only or a cluster of broader cognitive ones. This structured composite case study describes a senior executive with aphantasia who came to coaching wanting to improve her self discipline. It presents the client and coaches reflections on the utility of coaching and contains implications for coaching practice in this unusual area.
Our summary in plain words
What This Study Is About
Coaches often ask clients to picture success or imagine their ideal future. This paper describes how one coach worked with clients who can't call up mental images, and what he would advise other coaches.
How They Studied It
A composite case study: the author, who was the coach, blended several of his clients with similar conditions into one story, partly to protect their privacy.
He calls the blended client Margaret, a senior lawyer in her 50s.
The material comes from his session notes and reflective logs.
No imagery test is reported; she told the coach she had aphantasia.
What They Found
Margaret came to coaching to prepare better for a weekly partners' meeting and to stop putting things off. A target of 15 minutes of preparation, logged on her phone, was met in only half of the weeks, and she couldn't find a purpose for her work that satisfied her. Then she mentioned her aphantasia.
After the next session, the coach took a two-month break, read up on aphantasia and changed his approach. From then on he took care not to suggest visual methods or analogies. He also set out to work from her verbal and analytical strengths and to use phone reminders, written frameworks and a measurable action plan written down by both of them, though the case does not report these in use.
At the first session after the break, before the work on her values, she rated her understanding of the coaching steps (such as setting clear goals and taking small steps) as having moved from 2 to 8 out of 10, but her use of them only from 4 to 5. To find her purpose, the coach next asked for stories of turning points in her career, and then for four words for her values: achievement, integrity, justice and caring. Goals and daily habits followed from those words, and she felt that a weekly check on how well she lived by her values was very important.
No later ratings are reported, and the paper does not say whether her Tuesday preparation improved. In the final session, after the coach explained that he had kept mainly to non-visual methods, she said this had been important to the coaching's success because of her aphantasia. She also valued the time to reflect on her life and the coach's care, and said she had made some useful progress in improving her self-discipline.
What This Might Mean
The author suggests coaches watch for aphantasia early and use storytelling, goal setting, habit building and awareness work. He gives an example: ask a client to sum up an ideal future in three words instead of imagining it. He also says coaches shouldn't mistake trouble with imagination-based exercises for low motivation. He states that standard visualization gives these clients poor results, though this case didn't try it. It is one composite case written by the coach himself, and its only results are the client's own ratings and remarks, so it shows an approach rather than proving it works.
One Interesting Detail
Margaret said she understood her aphantasia more clearly when a fellow partner talked about "seeing" a concrete outcome to a negotiation they were both working on. She felt that being able to picture it helped him work out a step-by-step plan to reach it.
Coaches often ask clients to picture success or imagine their ideal future. This paper describes how one coach worked with clients who can't call up mental images, and what he would advise other coaches.
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Mental imagery ability is associated with visual working memory performance: evidence from aphantasic participants
Zhao, Vogel and Bainbridge · Neuropsychologia
On average, aphantasic participants were less accurate than controls at briefly remembering colours, fractals and words, even easy-to-name ones. Visual imagery may support visual working memory, and naming items did not appear to compensate.
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Inner speech and the architecture of social cognition: A commentary on Silvanto (2026)
Geva and Lœvenbruck · Cortex
Inner speech, more than visual imagery, may support social and emotional understanding, this commentary argues. If so, social differences reported in aphantasia may not stem from missing mental pictures.
2026
Congenital aphantasia: what we (think we) know, what we thought we knew but were mistaken about, and what we don't know
Arnold and colleagues · Consciousness and Cognition
Researchers propose an Emergent Property Framework where imagery arises from coordinated activity across a network of brain regions. This explains why aphantasia presents with diverse multisensory profiles and varying cognitive impacts.