When you imagine something — like the sun peeking over a mountain during an early morning rainstorm — do you see it with rich visual detail, or instead with very little internal picture? In an earlier episode we tackled the spectrum of visual imagination, from hyperphantasia to aphantasia — and in this episode we dive even deeper with guest Joel Pearson to surface the most surprising differences between people’s internal lives. How does your experience differ from other people’s, and how does your brain cobble together the skills you have to accomplish what you need?

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Take the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire

No Inner Voice? New Study Reveals Its Impact on Memory. Neuroscience News. May 14, 2024

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Hatakeyama T. On the Possibility That Individual Differences in Imagery Ability Have Innate Bases. The Japanese Journal of Mental Imagery, 2021, Volume 19, Issue 1, Pages 21-41.

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Bird G, Viding E. The self to other model of empathy: Providing a new framework for understanding empathy impairments in psychopathy, autism, and alexithymia. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews. 2014 Nov 1;47:520-32.

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Pearson J, Kosslyn SM. The heterogeneity of mental representation: Ending the imagery debate. Proceedings of the national academy of sciences. 2015 Aug 18;112(33):10089-92.

Kunzendorf R. Külpe’s Imageless But Visionary Idea: That Vivid Visual Images Are “Centrally Excited Sensations” Which Are Constructed From “Imageless Thoughts”. Imagination, Cognition and Personality. 2021 Mar;40(3):273-89.

Nedergaard JS, Lupyan G. Not Everybody Has an Inner Voice: Behavioral Consequences of Anendophasia. Psychological Science. 2024 May 10:09567976241243004

Also listen to Inner Cosmos Episode 59: Do you visualize like I do? With Ed Catmull

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