Mental Imagery

Mental imagery is the experience of perceiving sensory information, most often visual, in the absence of the corresponding external stimulus, such as picturing a familiar face or replaying a remembered scene. Imagery vividness varies widely between individuals and is commonly assessed using the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ); people with aphantasia report little or no voluntary visual imagery, while hyperphantasic individuals report imagery as detailed as perception. Mental imagery is relevant to accessibility because many memory-support, recall, and retrieval interfaces implicitly assume users can form vivid mental pictures, which excludes people with aphantasia and may be affected by conditions such as stroke, traumatic brain injury, and some forms of dementia. Designs that depend on imagery should offer alternative, less imagery-dependent paths.