COG PSYCH: Visual Imagery

Visual Imagery

Refers to the mental representation of visual information in the absence of actual visual input. It allows individuals to picture scenes, objects, or events without them being physically present.

Example of Visual Imagery

When you read a novel and imagine the setting or visualize what a character looks like, you're using visual imagery

Seeing with the mind's eye

Visual Imagery is often described as this

Mental Imagery

It is a broader term that refers to the experience of "perceiving" information without sensory input across any sensory modality, not just vision.

Auditory imagery

(hearing a song in your head)

Tactile imagery

(imagining the feel of velvet)

Olfactory imagery

(smelling cookies baking)

Gustatory imagery

(tasting lemon)

Kinesthetic imagery

(imagining yourself riding a bike)

Visual imagery

a subtype of mental imagery focused specifically on sight.

Imageless Thought Debate

This historical debate focused on whether all thought required mental images.

Würzburg School (led by Oswald Külpe)

Introduced the concept of"imageless thought," arguing that some thoughts occur without any accompanying images.

Example of "imageless thought"

Someone solving simple mathematical problems without forming any pictures of numbers may involve abstract, imageless reasoning.

Behaviorist Era

The debate (imageless thought) lost prominence during this era, where internal processes were largely ignored.

Cognitive Revolution

Debate (imageless thought) re-emerged in the mid-20th century.

Conceptual Peg Hypothesis

Proposed by Allan Paivio in his dual-coding theory, this hypothesis suggests that when people create images of concrete nouns, those images serve as "pegs" to hang associated information on.

Example of Conceptual Peg Hypothesis

If you imagine a "boat" and later associate it with the word "hat," you can mentally "see" a hat on a boat, helping you recall it later.

Mental Anchors

Conceptual Peg Hypothesis findings support the idea that visual imagery enhances memory by creating _______.

Mental Chronometry

Developed by Roger Shepard and Stephen Kosslyn, this technique measures the time required to perform mental operations.

Roger Shepard and Stephen Kosslyn

Developed the Mental Chronometry technique.

Example of Mental Chronometry

Mental rotation tasks involve showing participants two images of an object, one of which is rotated. Participants must decide if they are the same object. The more the image is rotated, the longer it takes to respond, suggesting that we rotate the image mentally in real-time, just as we would a real object.

Mental Scanning

Stephen Kosslyn's _______ experiments showed that people take longer to scan between two points on a mental image if the distance between them is greater.

Example of Mental Scanning

Participants first memorized a map of an island with landmarks like a hut, tree, and rock. When asked to imagine the island and mentally "scan" from the hut to the rock, response time increased with distance—just like in real vision.

Spatial; abstract concepts

Mental scanning suggest that mental images are ______, and NOT just _______.

Imagery Debate

Is imagery Spatial or Propositional?

Spatial Representations

These involve imagery that mirrors the actual layout and structure of objects in space.

Example of Spatial Representation

When mentally navigating your house from the front door to the kitchen, you are using a spatial representation of the house.

Depictive Representations

These are image-like representations that preserve the spatial layout of the scene.

Example of Depictive Representations

Mentally picturing a chessboard with pieces in their actual positions uses depictive representation.

Spatial; perception

Kosslyn defended the idea that visual images are _______ and share many mechanisms with ________, supported by empirical evidence.

Epiphenomenon

Imagery is an _____—like the steam from a train engine—it is real but does not play a causal role in cognition.

Zenon Pylyshyn

Argues that imagery is an epiphenomenon. He claimed that our brains use abstract, symbolic codes.

Propositional Representations

According to this theory, information is represented as propositions—abstract, language-like statements—not as pictures.

Example of Propositional Representations

The sentence "The cat is under the table" represents the spatial relationship without forming a mental image.

Size in the Visual Field

Kosslyn found that people can detect details better when imagining larger objects.

Example of Size in the Visual Field

Participants imagined a rabbit next to an elephant vs. next to a fly.

Mental Walk Task

Participants imagine walking toward a mental image of an animal and report when it begins to fill their visual field.

Example of Mental Walk Test

You'd bump into an elephant sooner than a cat in a mental walk.

Real perception

Mental Walk test supports the idea that mental imagery behaves like ______, following spatial rules.

Interactions of Imagery & Perception

Experiments show that visual imagery can interfere with or enhance perception.

Example of Interaction of Imagery & Perception

: If you imagine a green circle and then are shown a faint green circle, you're more likely to detect it—suggesting shared mechanisms.

Actual Visual Tasks

However, sometimes mental imagery can interfere with ________ (e.g.,

harder to perceive real objects while imagining something else).

Method of Loci

This ancient mnemonic strategy involves associating information with specific, familiar locations (like rooms in a house or landmarks on a walk).

Pegword Technique

This technique uses a predefined rhyme list (e.g., one-bun, two-shoe, three-tree) as "pegs" and associates them with new words using vivid mental images.

Spatial Imagery

This involves mentally representing and manipulating the spatial layout or orientation of objects.

Object Imagery

This is the ability to form detailed and vivid images of individual objects, focusing on color, shape, and texture.

VVIQ (Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire)

Developed by David Marks, this questionnaire assesses how vividly individuals can visualize scenarios.

Degraded Pictures Task

Participants are shown a series of images that are initially hard to recognize. Those with stronger visual imagery skills tend to identify the objects faster.

Mental Rotation Task

Participants are asked whether two images of an object are the same or mirror images. Response time increases with the angle of rotation required, showing that people mentally rotate images in real time.