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Visual working memory performance in aphantasia.

Christianne Jacobs1, Dietrich S Schwarzkopf2, Juha Silvanto3

  • 1Department of Psychology, University of Westminster, London, UK; Psychological Sciences Research Institute (IPSY), Universite Catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium.

Cortex; a Journal Devoted to the Study of the Nervous System and Behavior
|November 19, 2017
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Individuals with aphantasia, the inability to create mental images, struggle with high-precision visual working memory tasks. However, their performance on other mental imagery tasks remains comparable to controls.

Keywords:
AphantasiaMental imageryVisual working memory

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Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Neuroscience
  • Psychology

Background:

  • Aphantasia is the congenital inability to voluntarily create mental imagery.
  • Its impact on cognitive functions, particularly visual working memory, remains understudied.
  • This study explores the cognitive profile of individuals with aphantasia.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate visual working memory performance in an individual with aphantasia.
  • To determine if aphantasia is associated with specific cognitive impairments.
  • To explore the functional role of mental imagery in visual cognition.

Main Methods:

  • Assessed visual working memory performance in an aphantasic individual compared to controls.
  • Utilized tasks varying in precision requirements for visual working memory.
  • Included a task specifically designed to engage mental imagery.

Main Results:

  • The aphantasic individual performed significantly worse on high-precision visual working memory trials.
  • Performance on a mental imagery task did not differ from controls.
  • The aphantasic individual lacked metacognitive insight into her performance.

Conclusions:

  • Mental imagery plays a functional role in high-precision visual working memory.
  • Cognitive functions like high-precision working memory may be impaired in aphantasia.
  • Lack of mental imagery can be compensated in some cognitive tasks, but not others.