How do you measure something you can't see? Tools like the PSIQ and other imagery questionnaires let researchers quantify vividness and study it at scale.
Deery · Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences
Researchers propose that mental imagery is a modulation of bodily orientation rather than a neural simulation. This suggests aphantasia is a specific inability to willfully conjure sensory-like presence through this bodily imagination.
Kvamme, Nagai and Silvanto · Trends Open
Researchers found that mental imagery and emotion share a common generative substrate in the brain's interoceptive system. This suggests imagery disturbances across various conditions are direct consequences of underlying interoceptive dysfunction.
Panigutti and colleagues · Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews
This systematic review found only 11 studies on imagery and hallucinations in Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and schizophrenia, and none in Lewy body dementia. Seven reported a link and four did not, so the evidence is indecisive.
Ernst, Kronbichler and Meyer · Scientific Reports
Researchers found that imagining a moral dilemma from a third-person perspective is linked to higher acceptability of harmful actions. This suggests visual perspective, not just vividness, helps shape how we make moral decisions.
Calzavarini · Synthese
Researchers found that brain areas process mental imagery using modality-invariant properties rather than sensory-specific divisions. This suggests mental imagery and aphantasia are best understood through a supramodal framework.
Martin and colleagues · Learning and Individual Differences
Among 1,451 high school students, weaker imagery went with lower science scores, a gap that was smaller where students said teachers reduced mental load. The authors suggest such teaching may help weak imagers, but the data cannot show cause.
Vanbuckhave and colleagues · Psychophysiology
Pupil size changes in response to imagined brightness reflected trial-level vividness but not stable trait imagery scores. This suggests pupillometry tracks temporary imagery intensity rather than serving as a marker for overall ability.
Schwarzkopf and colleagues · Royal Society Open Science
Vividness ratings robustly capture a wide range of subjective experiences, from internal mental depictions to externally projected imagery. This suggests aphantasia should be redefined to distinguish between faint imagery and a total lack of pictorial representation.
Demas · Brain Sciences
Engineered pareidolia functions as externally scaffolded mental imagery where minimal visual cues recruit internal templates. This provides a quantifiable bridge between creative perception, imagination, and clinical neuropsychology.
Vanbuckhave and colleagues · Neuropsychologia
Pupillometry showed that imagined brightness modulates pupil size, but these changes did not correlate with individual self-reported imagery vividness. This suggests a dissociation between subjective reports and objective physiological measures of imagery.
Silvanto · Frontiers in Psychology
Mental imagery likely evolved from interoceptive processing to provide affectively-grounded simulations for decision-making. This suggests that aphantasia may stem from a decoupling of sensory information and internal bodily signals.
Tomastikova and Silson · Cortex
Researchers found that mental imagery of people, but not buildings, significantly primed subsequent perception in a binocular rivalry task. This suggests that the functional impact of imagery on perception is category-specific rather than a universal effect.
Lebron Flores and Moacdieh · International Journal of Design Creativity and Innovation
Students shown an AI-generated website before designing their own rated the experience lower, and for them imagery vividness did not predict how they felt about it. The authors say AI inspiration should be used with caution.
Rollo and colleagues · Brain and Cognition
Bilateral temporal cortex stimulation significantly reduced the volitional control of auditory imagery while leaving vividness largely unaffected. This suggests that the ability to manipulate internal sounds relies on specific temporal-cortical dynamics distinct from those supporting image clarity.
Gardner, Saurels and Arnold · Cortex
Researchers found that while imagining dark versus bright scenes modulates the pupillary response, this physiological change does not correlate with subjective imagery vividness ratings. This suggests pupillometry is not a reliable objective index for individual differences in imagery strength.
Kvamme and colleagues · Heliyon
In 591 young adults, more vivid imagery went with an inward-focused style: attention to body signals, mindfulness, and openness. In statistical models, imagery related to mental health only through this style, partly through lower alexithymia.
Chen and colleagues · Empirical Studies of the Arts
Higher sensory imagery ability is associated with increased emotional valence, arousal, and aesthetic appeal when viewing paintings. This suggests that mental imagery capacity significantly enhances the richness of aesthetic experiences.
Pepin and colleagues · Consciousness and Cognition
Involuntary mental imagery is more frequent and vivid than hallucinations, though both share similar phenomenological traits. This suggests these inner experiences exist on a continuum rather than being entirely distinct phenomena.
Peruski · Journal of Neurophysiology
Aphantasics showed reduced right-brain activation and increased left middle frontal gyrus activity during motor imagery. This suggests they use compensatory semantic strategies, indicating mental imagery is not essential for motor cognition.
Wang and colleagues · Proceedings of the SIGGRAPH Asia 2025 Posters
A VR system using guided imagery and spatial tasks significantly improved imagery clarity and recall in people with imagery deficits. This suggests that leveraging preserved spatial cognition can help rebuild visual imagery pathways.