PSYC2001

Cognitive Psychology
Connecting Mind, Research, and Everyday Experience
E. Bruce Goldstein (4th Edition)
Visiting Lecturer: Mariyam Nashaya Hassan
Villa College
Visual Imagery
Chapter 10
What is Visual Imagery?
It is the ability to recreate a visual representation of a stimulus in the
absence of sensory input (eg: when you cannot see that stimulus)
Imagery can also occur in other senses.

• How many windows are there in your house?

• Are cats’ ears round or pointy?
• Is the blue in ocean darker than the blue in sky?
History of Imagery in
Psychology
Early Ideas About Imagery
Wilhem Wundt
• Early psychologists felt that images
were one of the three basic elements
of consciousness (sensation and
feelings were the others)
• First to adopt introspection
Controversy!
Imageless Thought Debate
• Over whether it is possible to have thoughts that are not accompanied
by images.
• This debate occurred in the late 19th century and was critical to the
introspectionist program because they studied imagery as a window
into thought processes.
• If some thought was not accompanied by images, it was not clear how
it could be studied.
Good-Bye Imagery
John Watson
• Father of behaviorism

• “Give me a dozen healthy infants...”

• Felt that the study of imagery was

unproductive.
Imagery and Cognitive Revolution

Imagery Reenters Psychology

• Refuted claims that imagery was impossible to study
• Demonstrated imagery had functional role – as seen
in memory tasks like paired associate learning
• Key point of Paivio’s work – imagery impacts
memory

Major Turning Point – Allan Paivio’s Studies (1960s)

Imagery in Psychology
Paivio’s Conceptual-Peg Hypothesis

• Found concrete words are easier to recall than abstract nouns due to
imagery.
 Demonstrating that Imagery Exists
Shepard & Metzler (1971)
• Mental chronometry Task: determining the amount
of time needed to carry out various cognitive tasks.
• Participants saw two objects, had to indicate quickly
whether the two objects were the same or different

Stimuli used in mental rotation experiment

 Demonstrating that Imagery Exists
Results
• Time it took to indicate that they were the same object was directly related to how
far the object had to be rotated

Interpretation
• Imagery and perception share some of the same mechanisms
• Shepard and Metzler’s results showed that mental and perceptual images both
involve spatial representation of the stimulus.
• Note: First experiment to use quantitative methods in the study of imagery.
 Do imagery and perception share the same
mechanisms?
Kosslyn (1973)

Procedure
• Task: Memorize an image, then answer the questions about whether
certain parts appear in the image
• Time it takes to say yes is related to distance between initial focus and
correct part
 Do imagery and perception share the same
mechanisms?
Stimulus for image-scanning experiment
 Do imagery and perception share the same
mechanisms?
Results
• It took longer for participants to find parts that are located farther from the
initial point of focus

Interpretation
• Evidence a spatial nature of imagery existed

• They were scanning across the image of the object so it makes sense that
part located further way would take them longer to get to
 Do imagery and perception share the same
mechanisms?
Alternative Interpretation

Lea (1975)
• Proposed that as participants scanned, they may have encountered other
interesting parts such as the cabin, and this distraction increased their
reaction time
Imagery Debate: Spatial or
Propositional
 Imagery Debate: Spatial or Propositional
Kosslyn’s experiments were convincing, but there was yet another
alternative explanation.

Pylyshyn (1973)
• Felt results are based on propositional mechanisms, not on spatial
representation
• Ushered in the imagery debate (still going on)
Close your eyes and form a
mental image of a palm
tree.
Did you see a picture of a palm
tree?
Did you describe a palm tree to
yourself?
Visual Imagery Debate
Imagery Debate: Are mental images stored using a spatial code (eg: in
picture form) or a propositional code (eg: language form)?
spatial code propositional code
“Made with glass and wood. Have
green curtains. Opens to the road.”
spatial code propositional code

“A grey cat with fluffy tails is

under the brown table, on a pink
pillow.”
Spatial Coding Theories
Mental images are stored in the form of a pictorial code.
• Basically, we store a picture of an image.
Spatial Coding Theories
This theory predict there is a large overlap in the brain between the
areas involved in perception and areas involved in mental imagery.

• Prediction: Responses to real objects and mental images of those

object should be similar.
Propositional Coding Theories
Mental images are stored in the form of a language-like code.
Propositional Coding Theories
Although we experience mental images in picture form, that is not how
the brain codes them.
Example explanation: picture storage in computers.

• Prediction: Responses to real objects and mental images of those

objects will often be different.
Form a mental image of a tiger.

1. How many stripes does your mental

image have?

If you are looking at an actual picture, it would be fairly easy to count

the number of stripes.

If your mental image was truly in the form a picture, it would be easy to
answer the question.
Imagery and Distance
• Form a mental image of the map of Male’ City.
• Image three locations on your mental image:
• Hulhumale, Male’ and Villingili
• While maintaining the mental image, form an image of a black dot,
and move that dot from Hulhumale to Male’
• Then, move that dot from Hulhumale to Villingili
• Which took longer?
• Which two districts would take you longer to move between in an
actual map of Male’ City?
Imagery and Distance
In your mental image, it took you longer to move the dot from
Hulhumale’ to Villingili than Hulhumale to Male’
In real map as well.

Support Spatial Coding Theories:

Responses to real objects and mental images of those object should
be similar.
Imagery and Distance
Kosslyn et al. (1978)
• Participants learned the layout of
an island with various objects
different distances from each
other
• Then, they imagined traveling
between these objects and their
time to do so was recorded.
Imagery and Distance
Result:
• The time to travel between
imagined locations increased as
the distance traveled in the image
increased.
• Suggests participants were
traveling between locations in a
pictorial representation of the
figure.
This research provide support
for spatial coding theories.
Imagery and Ambiguous Figures
Form a mental image of this figure.
Imagery and Ambiguous Figures
Form a mental image of this figure.

• Does it contain a parallelogram?

Imagery and Ambiguous Figures
Form a mental image of this figure.

• Does it contain a parallelogram?

People are generally poor at

identifying other shapes in mental
images, but not in actual images.

In the actual experiment, participants

were able to identify only 14% of the
time.
Imagery and Ambiguous Figures

• Suggests mental images are NOT

stored in a pictorial code

This research provide support for

propositional coding theories.
Imagery and Ambiguous Figures
Form a mental image of this figure.
 Imagery Debate: Spatial or
Propositional
Basic idea: just because the experience is spatial doesn’t mean the underlying
representation is
▹ Spatial experience of mental images could be an epiphenomenon

▹ epiphenomenon—something that accompanies the real mechanism

but is not actually part of the mechanism.
▹ Information could be encoded with language (propositional
representation) or with images (depictive representations) – can’t tell
This kind of explanation proposes that imagery operates in a way similar to the semantic networks
How does Pylyshyn Explain Kosslyn’s First
Set of Results?
Tacit-Knowledge explanation

• People in the mental scanning task behave based on what happens in a real scene

• Participants unconsciously use knowledge about the world in making judgments

• In the real world it takes longer to travel greater distances

• Simulate this behavior in the experiment

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 Against Propositional Representation
Finke & Pinker (1982)

Procedure

• Short presentation of simple display with

4 random dots, followed (after 2-sec
delay) by an arrow

• Participants had to say whether the arrow

pointed to one of the dots in the first
display (gone now) 40
Against Propositional Representation
Results

• Longer responses for greater distances

Interpretations

• No time to convert to propositions, no meaning in the dots (except spatial

relations)

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Imagery Neurons
Some neurons respond to seeing certain objects

• Those neurons can fire when that object is imagined

in the brain

Perception

Imagery

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Brain Imaging
LeBihan et al. (1993)

Compared the brain areas that are activated at three times:

• When a person observed perceptions of actual visual stimuli (perception)

• When the person was imagining the stimulus (imagery)

• When the visual stimulus was not present; no imagery was performed

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Brain Imaging

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Apparently it's Not the End of The Debate…
Pylyshyn (2001)

• Argues that just as the spatial experience of mental images is an epiphenomenon,

brain activity can also be an epiphenomenon

• Posits that brain activity in response to imagery may indicate that something is
happening, but may have nothing to do with causing imagery

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Neuropsychological Case Studies
• Perceptual problems are accompanied by problems with imagery

• People who have lost the ability to see color due to brain damage are also unable
to create colors through imagery

• People who have unilateral neglect in perception also have unilateral neglect in
imagery

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Neuropsychological Case Studies
• Perceptual problems are accompanied by problems with imagery

• Uilateral Neglect

• Brain damage to attentional centers of the brain (right parietal lobe)

• Patients ignore half the visual field

• Oftentimes, the left half of the visual field is ignored

• Right hemisphere brain damage = Left visual field impairment

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Neuropsychological Case Studies
Other case studies
• Perceptual problems are accompanied by problems with imagery

• In typical experiments with unilateral damaged patients, the patient is asked to identify
objects held up

• Objects on left & right: Only right object seen

• Object only on the left: Left object is seen

• Almost as if right field takes precedence

• Unilateral Neglect
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Does this work for imagery, too?
• Unilateral neglect patients ignore half of the visual field. But what
about imagery?

Bisiach & Luzzatti (1978)

• Researchers asked an Italian patient to imagine standing in the Piazza

del Duomo in Milan (familiar to patient)

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Perceptual Problems are accompanied by
problems with imagery
Results
• “Face north. What do you see?”
• Only describes things on his right
• “Turn around. What do you see?”
• Only describes things on his right (but was on the left originally!)
Interpretation
• Neglect works on imagery, too!
Bisiach & Luzzatti (1978)

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Conclusions from the imagery debate

• Imagery and perception are closely related

• Some shared mechanisms; not all

• fMRIs confirm this; brain activation is not complete

• Perception is stable; imagery fragile

• Harder to manipulate mental images

Uses of Imagery
Using Imagery to Improve Memory

• How does imagery help improve memory for two things?

• Method of Loci- a method in which things to be remembered are

placed at different locations in a mental image of a spatial layout.
Pegword Technique Associate to-do items
with concrete nouns
• Rhyme number words with concrete nouns

• One—bun

• Two—shoe

• Three—tree

• Four—door

• Five--hive
Pegword Technique Associate to-do items
with concrete nouns
• The next step is to pair each of these things to be
remembered with each pegword by creating a vivid
image of your item-to-be-remembered with the
object represented by the word.
• First thing you have to do: go to the dentist
• One—bun
• Associate dentist with bun