title: Vividness of Visual Imagery Depends on the Neural Overlap with Perception in Visual Areas.
abstract: Research into the neural correlates of individual differences in imagery vividness point to an important role of the early visual cortex. However, there is also great fluctuation of vividness within individuals, such that only looking at differences between people necessarily obscures the picture. In this study, we show that variation in moment-to-moment experienced vividness of visual imagery, within human subjects, depends on the activity of a large network of brain areas, including frontal, parietal, and visual areas. Furthermore, using a novel multivariate analysis technique, we show that the neural overlap between imagery and perception in the entire visual system correlates with experienced imagery vividness. This shows that the neural basis of imagery vividness is much more complicated than studies of individual differences seemed to suggest.
  
  
  
  Visual imagery is the ability to visualize objects that are not in our direct line of sight: something that is important for memory, spatial reasoning, and many other tasks. It is known that the better people are at visual imagery, the better they can perform these tasks. However, the neural correlates of moment-to-moment variation in visual imagery remain unclear. In this study, we show that the more the neural response during imagery is similar to the neural response during perception, the more vivid or perception-like the imagery experience is.
authors.affiliation: Radboud University, Donders Insitute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, 6525 EN, Nijmegen, The Netherlands n.dijkstra@donders.ru.nl.
authors.forename: Nadine
authors.identifier: 0000-0003-1423-9277
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Dijkstra
authors.affiliation: Radboud University, Donders Insitute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, 6525 EN, Nijmegen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Sander E
authors.identifier: 0000-0001-6845-0911
authors.initials: SE
authors.lastname: Bosch
authors.affiliation: Radboud University, Donders Insitute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, 6525 EN, Nijmegen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Marcel A J
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-2206-9098
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: van Gerven
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination / Q000502:physiology*; D007206:Individuality; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term / Q000502:physiology; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000502:physiology; D010296:Parietal Lobe / Q000502:physiology; D014793:Visual Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: mental imagery; multivariate analyses; neural overlap; perception; working memory