The mind's eyes: Distinct neural correlates of spatial and object imagery

Mental imagery has long been central to understanding human cognition, yet its neural basis remains debated. Although neuroimaging studies often treat mental imagery as a unitary construct, behavioral research suggests a dissociation between object imagery (visualizing static objects in detail) and spatial imagery (visualizing dynamic transformations of objects and their relations). To test whether these forms of imagery rely on distinct neural systems, we conducted a pre-registered activation likelihood estimation (ALE) meta-analysis of 46 fMRI and PET studies (N = 591; 772 foci). Conjunction analyses revealed overlapping activity across the medial frontal gyrus, precuneus, and inferior parietal lobule, suggesting a common frontoparietal network underlying general imagery processes. However, contrast analyses revealed patterns of activation dependent on imagery type (object vs. spatial). While spatial imagery was associated with unique activation in bilateral superior parietal lobules, consistent with dorsal visual stream involvement, object imagery elicited unique activation in left-lateralized frontoparietal and ventral stream regions. These findings parallel the dual-stream model of visual processing, suggesting that object imagery, like object recognition, engages the ventral "what" stream, whereas spatial imagery, like spatial perception and transformation, engages the dorsal "where/how" stream. Theoretically, this distinction offers a new perspective on an old debate, namely, the extent to which mental imagery mirrors perception. Our findings suggest that the answer depends on the type of imagery engaged, pointing to task-specific alignment between imagery and perception. Practically, these results invite a reappraisal of how imagery relates to academic, occupational, and everyday behaviors, raising new questions about how different forms of imagery may support distinct cognitive processes.