Founder of Aphantasia Network and one of the pioneering 21 cases that brought aphantasia to light. With a personal journey deeply intertwined with the phenomenon, Tom is at the forefront of raising awareness, fostering community, and championing the unique experiences of those with aphantasia
Do people without Aphantasia, close their eyes and see an image instead of blackness? Yes! The majority of people close their eyes and see images in their mind. Many can see those images with eyes open as well.
We've been following the researchers lead when it comes to language. As you noted, researchers are largely using the term 'aphantasic' - including Zeman, Pearson, and many of their partners, who collectively make up a large majority of the extreme imagination research space. There actually is more disparity in the definitions of aphantasia then there is in the terminology used to describe a person with aphantasia lol
Have you ever read this theory about language evolution, it's a wonderful read and speaks to the potential impact slight variations in cognitive processes could have. I do tend to think these variations in imagery abilities are evolutionarily fit divergences, there are obvious collective advantages in diversity. And there is definitely scientific interest into this question of genetics, it's only a matter of time before we have some more conclusive answers. But as Shannon mentioned, the current data does suggest the possibility of a genetic component - aphantasics in that study were shown to be 10x as likely to have a 1st degree relative with aphantasia.
WOW! I can't imagine what that's like, to have a memory of a memory from within a dream that is so convincing you believe you actually killed someone. My experience with memories is quite the opposite - I have to interrogate my mind to recall if something happened. A fairly common experience when reconnecting with long-cherished friends is being told of a shared experience in which I have no/little immediate recollection. I have to ask for details and then slowly the memories reveals itself from the mist.You may have read that aphantasics apparently have an easier time moving on from things. This is wholly true for me, and this ease manifests itself in various ways: I am a nomad who's cultivated many wonderful relationships with people around the US, however I almost spend no time maintaining these relationships virtually as I am often single-mindedly aware of the people, place, things, goals, and challenges that share my current position in space and time. Mental time travel is something that I do intentionally, far more than I do passively. I also rarely think of capturing moments with photos or documentation. I like looking at photos, but I don't vividly re-experience moments when I see or hear about them. So when I'm looking over a majestic landscape or reconnecting with the people I love, I very rarely have the urge to take a photo or video. I find giving all of my attention to those moments far more meaningful. And when I lose someone I do grieve, however the grief is far more somatic than it is mental. I feel the ache, but I do not ruminate endlessly. Instead, I usually begin framing the situation pretty quickly. If it's a death, I take on the purpose of supporting others through their own grieving process. In the case of a break-up, I begin asking myself how this was the best thing that could happen to me (both the relationship and the break-up). And in most situations, I am almost always asking myself "what can I learn from this?" But the other side of hyper-vivid imagery sounds pretty awesome, being able to hold and manipulate complex mental models. This was something that didn't make any sense to me prior to learning about aphantasia. I've always felt inclined for systems thinking, however I often have to put it all down on paper or spreadsheet if there is more than a handful of relationships at play within a given system. It's fascinating to learn more about all this, especially when it comes to being able to apply my improved awareness and understanding of neurodiverse cognitive strategies within my real-world team and leadership roles.
The audio double-takes resonate with me - ba dum tss đ„đ€Ł But seriously, I've observed that the only type of ruminating that I semi-regularly engage in is conversations and literature. My experience with literature is less redundant, whereas I may circle back through a conversation (from the recent past or forthcoming) many times over, gradually reworking and refining my language each run through. I believe I've naturally reinforced this habit over time as a form of self-directed dialectic/charisma training. Socializing, relationship building, brainstorming, and coaching are all skill sets I've leaned into heavily throughout my life, but this habitual linguistic critiquing has always been more of a compulsive reflex that I only recently began to recognize. Outside this process, I don't frequently engage in any other sorts of mental time travel.
I also have found it difficult describing my inner world, and I assume most people can relate with this challenge. The only reason I can express my experiences with any level of lucidity is countless hours of self-reflection and conversations like this haha That's an astute observation of emotion being expressed through your body language but not in your mind's voice. It actually relates to a surprising observation I made when I first came up with that experiment of mentally whispering and then screaming "hello". That was when I realized, they sound no different and that a mind's voice isn't necessarily composed of auditory imagery, however what really shocked me was that I experienced a very pronounced stress response immediately following the imaginary scream! All of a sudden, my heart was racing and anxiousness swooped through my body!
One of our community journalists at the Network just published an article on her experience of meditation with aphantasia, I think you will enjoy it! Also, we'll be publishing another article by Liana tomorrow, guess what the topic is?! ... her experience of hypnosis with aphantasia!!
Hi Kathy, you may want to check out the article Discover You: Navigating Therapy and Aphantasia. It was written by one of our science journalists, Harrison Chapman, who is pursuing his doctorate in counseling psychology and is also aphantasic. You can also search "therapy" or "anxiety" in the top right-hand corner, and see all the discussions and articles mentioning these topics!
But to clarify, I do not 'hear' the language in my mind. I have aphantasia across all imagery spectrums, including auditory!
I predominantly think in words, and actually do my best thinking while in discussion with others. I find it difficult holding multiple abstract ideas in my mind in unison, and will either rely on speaking through complex logic aloud to clarify my thinking or break-down the systems into component parts and logic in a spreadsheet or on a sketch pad. But again, my most reliable critical thinking tool is collaborative brainstorming. I think this is largely benefitted by the emphasis I place on asking strategic questions, and in conversations I can focus more on asking these questions which not only receive answers from my counterpart but then allows for more comprehensive idea-critiquing, and compliments some of my cognitive inefficiencies - like juggling too much mentally or moving more slowly through thought experiments.Not sure if I explained that well, it's an hour past my bedtime haha
This is a great observation! The fascinating thing is, these types of peculiar proficiencies and inefficiencies are actually far more common than we realize. The more of these conversations I've had, the more I've realized just how unique each of our internal experiences are. It's not as simple as classifying everyone as aphantasic, phantasic, or hyperphantasic. Not only are there different imagery spectrums (visual, auditory, motor, spatial, etc) but those spectrums can be broken down into sub-spectrums, and one may even have hyperphantasic memory but be unable to modify their memories whatsoever or imagine anything novel (this is the case for both my brother and dad)!Enjoy this fascinating collective journey we are on, decoding our imagination. There is much to learn, and the conversation is never dull hahaIf you haven't heard yet, we actually have been developing a multisensory imagery assessment that will help us better understand our unique imagery profiles - check out Imagination Spectrum!
Wow, the examples you gave seem like pretty heavy 'memories' to carry! Have you developed any heuristics to help distinguish these vivid dreams from real life? Your description of visualizing microbiological systems is fascinating, it actually invoked a realization over a personal story that made no sense to me at the time: I heard this eccentric researcher, Bruce Damer, telling the story of how he came up with a new promising theory on the origins of life, which sounded like it involved taking ayahuasca or some other type of plant-based psychedelic and visualizing the origins process unfold.This made no sense to me because my experience with ayahuasca and like-substances has often been one including ego-death and awe for all things, especially the natural world, but no sort of revolutionary visualizations or coherent messages from the beyond. But for hyper visualizers, these sorts of mental scenes are likely often at play, especially when it comes to your line of work. So his visualizations, while they may have been profound in concept, weren't necessarily earth-shattering in respect to his ability of seeing a biological process unfold in his mind. I'm curious, have many scientific insights come to you during the process of visualizing?
Thanks for sharing, it's descriptions like your own that helped me begin seeing each imagery spectrum (auditory, visual, etc) as being made up of far more distinct experiences than can simply be classified into 3 buckets: aphantasia, phantasia, or hyperphantasia. It isn't as simple as saying 'I do/don't/kinda have a mind's voice', there are so many aspects and abilities that may vary within each modality! With the support of Zeman, Pearson, and other wonderful researchers, we have been developing and scientifically validating a new imagery assessment that is designed to address these nuances. It's called Imagination Spectrum, please let me know if you take it - I'd be curious to see you unique imagery profile! I have bookmarked your other post, it looks like you've spent a lot of time reflecting over your inner world! I'll hold my questions until I've taken time to fully review!! Thanks, LĂȘ Äá»nh!
Hi Chelsea, do you remember ever having visual imagery or an internal monologue? The current research suggests that the majority of aphantasics have been aphantasic since birth. Professors Zeman, Pearson and other prominent researchers have stated they believe that congenital aphantasia is a natural variation of the human experience, though much research is to be done before we can say for sure. All that said, there are certainly cases of acquired aphantasia and medications and depression seem to be correlations that need to be researched to determine whether either might be causal.
Hey Chloe & Nick, I wanted to let you know a new community member with a similar experience just posted a new discussion, SSRI-Induced Aphantasia? I wanted to let you know, in case you wanted to connect with her. I've come across a handful of similar accounts since you posted this discussion Chloe, I'm going to see if we could get any researchers interested in examining acquired aphantasia in medicated teens and let you know if I know of anything in the works. Hope you both are doing well!Â
There have been a few teens with depression and who are on medication that experienced diminished imagery throughout their later teens. This hasn't been any research published yet, so we'd be hard-pressed to separate correlation from causation at this point, but I am going to speak with the research community to see if any research ion this topic has begun. I'll invite some other community members with similar experience to this discussion, so you can connect with them!
I can relate to having trouble empathizing with others, I often feel the urge to immediately begin problem-solving or reframing their situation when people share their emotional burdens with me. I've learned over the years to hold back on the calculated logic when people really just want to be heard, focus on their body language (which helps me better feel their emotions), and slowing transitioning from questions about how they feel to questions regarding what lessons, insights, or gifts they might be able to gain from a situation. Are you referring to fictional characters within books, shows, movies? Rebecca Keogh and Joel Pearson recently found that visual perceptions and imagery play a critical role in our emotions. So seeing a hard event occur would likely have greater emotional impact than being told. And there is something about reading and writing that engages the brain in a way that generates greater emotional response than just thinking about it. Do you relate with this?
Hi Koh, nice to connect with you! I did not take acting as a career path, however I did some acting in school and have done my fair share of public speaking as an adult. But unrelated to either of those ventures, I've actually spent a long time analyzing and practicing these skills of emotional recall and physicalizing a character. I'm happy to share my approaches in case you could gain any value from them! Emotional Recall - I developed a practice called DEEP (Deliberate Emotional Embodiment Practice), which consists of four steps: 1) Compile a list of emotions you wish to generate at will; 2) Reflect on and record how each of these emotions feel in the body (i.e buoyancy in the stomach, hairs raising on the back of your neck, warmness in your cheeks, etc.) and gestures that personify these emotional experiences; 3) Order these emotions in a sequence that feel like a smooth transition from one to the next; 4) Write and affirmation for each emotion (i.e. "I am enthusiastic"); 5) Familiarize yourself with these emotions and practice running through your list, reading your affirmations aloud, acting out these gestures and imagining these sensations for each emotion until you actually feel them. Once you've learned to do this you can begin switching up the order to practice new sequences, setting audio recording alarms of these statements multiple times a day, and getting better at generating these emotions on command. Physicalizing a character - Read Bourne Identity haha
Not that I'm aware of, but I also don't have a ton of experience with cannabis. I believe there is a research looking into the effects of psilocybin on aphantasics and phantasics. I'm hoping the researcher will present at Extreme Imagination Conference!
Nice, if I had auditory imagery I think I'd most use it to play my own theme music. I wear headphones much of the day, using music as a way to modulate my mood and stay focused. I'm curious, are you easily distracted by noises in your environment? This sort of hypersensitivity is reported somewhat often, and I recently heard Joel Pearson something along these lines (that aphantasics appear to be more sensitive/attentive to sounds and less so to visuals). No major studies published on this yet, though. Anyway, I'm just wondering whether this may be less prevalent in aphantasics who have auditory imagery!