Imagery

www.lascap.de/Page-Stats/Englische_Seite/Cogpsy2005/Cognitiveive_Psychology2005__Memory_II.ppt

http://www.mtsu.edu/~sschmidt/Cognitive/Imagery.pdf

What is the Nature of

Visual Images?
Telephone receiver larger than DVD Remote?
Are they like pictures in your head?
Are they more like abstract descriptions?
Internal by Nature:
Behaviorists: Images NOT observed, not a
topic of investigation
Behaviorists focused only on observable
behavior

Propositional vs. Analog

Controversial Issue:
Analogical Representation:
Imagery is like (Analogous to) perception, retaining
some of the sensory qualities of perception.
For a Triangle, the physical parts of the triangle are
registered in the cognitive system in a form that
preserves the physical features of (A picture of a
triangle)
According to this approach Imagery should be like
perception

Propositional vs. Analog

Propositional Representation:
Descriptive code, language-like representation
Storage is neither visual or spatial
A close relative to language
Images just descriptions of visual scenes
According to this approach, imagery should be
similar to language.

Images vs. propositional representations

Physical images

Depict
In an analogue manner
(continuous mapping,
smooth
transformations)
Are spatially
isomorphic with what
they represent

Propositional

Describe (objects,
features, and their
relations)
Use discrete symbols
Have conventional &
arbitrary correspondence
between symbol and
symbolized

Evidence
The Dual Task-Method (Brooks, 1968):
Verbal task: Read sentence:
The Bird is in the BUSH
Verbal: Response (speaking) Yes or NO
Bird is a noun, BUSH is a noun
Spatial (imagery): Point (with your finger) YES
or NO printed on a piece of paper

Evidence Cont...
Spatial task (imagery): Imagine outline of letter F
(beginning with the lower left and moving around
the outside) and Classify the corners by saying
YES if corner is on top or bottom and NO if it is
anywhere else.
Verbal Response:
Say Yes or NO
Spatial Response:
Point Yes or NO
Printed on a piece
of paper

Results
Modality Specific Interference
Faster when there was a mismatch between
Spatial and verbal:
Sentence (Verbal) vs. Speaking (Verbal)
SLOWER
Sentence (Verbal) vs. Pointing (Imagery)
FASTER
Image (Imagery) vs. Pointing (Imagery)
SLOWER
Image (Imagery) vs. Speaking (Verbal) Faster

T im e to C o m p le te T a s k (s e c )

D a ta fro m B ro o k s (1 9 6 8 )
30
25
20
P o in tin g

15

S p e a k in g

10
5
0
S e n te n c e

Im a g e (D ia g ra m )

T y p e o f T a sk

Conclusion
Results consistent with the
idea that there are two
systems:
Analogical and Propositional
Systems

STS Analogical?
Mental Rotation: Shepard's
task
Rotation time related
(Positively correlated) to
distance rotated

arts.uwaterloo.ca/~celiasmi/courses/Phil256/webslides/7.imagery.pdf

Normal or Reversed?

psy-www-old.psy.ed.ac.uk/Local/Lectures/Y4Options/option_4_2.ppt

Normal or Reversed?

psy-www-old.psy.ed.ac.uk/Local/Lectures/Y4Options/option_4_2.ppt

Normal or Reversed?

psy-www-old.psy.ed.ac.uk/Local/Lectures/Y4Options/option_4_2.ppt

Normal or Reversed?

psy-www-old.psy.ed.ac.uk/Local/Lectures/Y4Options/option_4_2.ppt

Caption: Stimuli for Shepard and Metzlers (1971) mental

rotation experiment. (Excerpted with permission from Mental
Rotation of Three-Dimensional Objects, by R.N. Shepard & J.
Metzler. From Science, 171, pp. 701-703., Fig. 1A&B.
Copyright 1971 AAAS.)

Mental rotation task

Copyright Allyn & Bacon 2009

Mental rotation studies (Shepard &

colleagues)

Forward Rs

Backward Rs

On the next slide, count the number

of forward Rs that are on your side of
the screen (left or right). Clap when
done.
Cognition: Theory and Applications,
7/E by Stephen K. Reed
Copyright 2007 by Wadsworth
Publishing, a division of Thomson
Learning. All rights reserved.

Cognition: Theory and Applications,

7/E by Stephen K. Reed
Copyright 2007 by Wadsworth
Publishing, a division of Thomson
Learning. All rights reserved.

Cognition: Theory and Applications,

7/E by Stephen K. Reed
Copyright 2007 by Wadsworth
Publishing, a division of Thomson
Learning. All rights reserved.

http://www.mtsu.edu/~sschmidt/Cognitive/Imagery.p

Degree of rotation 0

45

RR

90

.6
sec

R
R
R

Reaction time

1 sec

R
R

135 180 225 270 315 360(0)

Cooper & Shepard (1973)

www.cosy.informatik.unibremen.de/staff/barkowsky/semSpaCog/Mental_Imagery_and_Human_Memory.p
df

Reaction Time for Deciding that Pairs of Figures Are the Same as a
Function of the Angle of Rotation and the Nature of the Rotation

Shepard & Metzler

(1971, Science)

Stimuli are same

or mirror images:
S decides which.

PICTURE
PLANE
ROTATIONS

ROTATIONS
IN DEPTH

psynet.ex.ac.uk:8200/vrr/1121/psy1121-06-5VRR.ppt

Conclusion from Mental rotation

experiments (Shepard et al):

We appear to transform the

representation in a way analogous to

rotating one picture or physical object
into correspondence with another.

Kosslyns image-scanning experiments

S memorizes map, which is
then removed
Instructed to focus
mentally on place (e.g. the
well).
The name of another place
(e.g. the beach) is then
presented.
S is instructed to look for
that place, pressing one key
when they find it, another if
they cannot.
psynet.ex.ac.uk:8200/vrr/1121/psy1121-06-5VRR.ppt

found it trials

Kosslyn concludes:
S is scanning a mental
image of the scene much
as one would scan an
exterior scene or a picture
with eye movements.

Kosslyn (1985) Imagery and Size

Question: Do we have faster RT for larger
objects?

Problem: How do you manipulate the size

of someones mental image?

Kosslyn (1985) Imagery and Size

Solution: Have them imagine pairs of
animals
-Small image: Imagine a rabbit next to an
elephant
-Large image: Imagine a rabbit next to an
insect

Caption: These pictures represent images that Kosslyns (1978)

participants created, which filled different portions of their visual
field. (a) Imagine elephant and rabbit, so elephant fills the field. (b)
Imagine rabbit and fly, so rabbit fills the field. Reaction times indicate
how long it took participants to answer questions about the rabbit.

arts.uwaterloo.ca/~celiasmi/courses/Phil256/webslides/7.imagery.p
df

Kosslyn (1985) Imagery and Size

Results
-Judgments for large images was .21 sec
faster than judgments for small objects
-Analog or propositional?
-Intons-Peterson Results could be due to
experimenter expectancy
-Kosslyns follow-up study

Moyers Research
-Borrowed ideas from psychophysics and
used them in imagery experiments
-In psychophysics, large differences
are judged faster than small diff.s
-Ss asked to image two animals & varied
the size difference
-rabbit vs. elephant --- horse vs. zebra

Results
-Smaller differences lead to longer RTs
-Similar to psychophysics results
-Analog or propositional?

Imagery and Ambiguous

Figures

1. Reed (1974)
-See Demo on next set of
slides

Imagery and Ambiguous Figures

Study the figure below and form a clear Mental image of
the figure

Consult you mental image

from the prior slide. Does
that mental image contain
a parallelogram?

Imagery and Ambiguous Figures

In Original Study: Star followed by PARALLELOGRAM or TRIANGLES Shown

Very Briefly

Reed (1974) Results

-With Star of David, they were correct
only 14% of the time.
-Overall, they were correct only 55% of
the time
-This is not much better than 50/50 guessing

Interpretation

Since they did so poorly the

image was probably NOT stored as pictures/analog

Chambers & Reisberg

(1985)
-Showed subjects images that could be
interpreted in two ways

Chambers & Reisberg

(1985)
DUCK OR RABBIT!

Chambers & Reisberg

(1985)
-Once image was removed they were
asked to provide the alternative
interpretation
-Results: NONE of the subjects could
perform the task
-Analog or Propositional?

Physiological Evidence

Roland & Friberg (1985)

Measured Cerebral blood flow while subjects:

1. Performed mental arithmetic
2. Thought of a musical jingle
3. Visually imaged a walk through their
neighborhood
Results? Increased blood flow in visual cortex in
imagery task
-Analog or Propositional?

Conclusion on Visual Imagery

Mixed results/conclusions!!!!
For concrete images, it appears to be
analogical
Yet, for ambiguous images, it appears to be
propositional
There are also some differences with reference
to STS and LTS

Miscellaneous Imagery
Research

Cognitive Maps
Cognitive Map: Mental Representation of environment that surrounds us)
Spatial Cognition: Our thoughts about spatial issues: How we remember the world we
navigate and how we keep track o objects in a spatial array.

Thorndyke (1981)
-Created fictional map with cities separated by 100,
200, 300 or 400 miles.
-Varied the # of intervening cities between major cities
-Ss studies map until they accurately reconstruct it
-Estimate the distance between specified pairs of
cities

Results
-More intervening cities lead to higher
estimates of distance:
When Cities were 300 miles apart, and there
were no intervening cities, participants
estimated the distance to be 280 miles.
These same cities were estimated to be 350
miles apart with three intervening cities.
-Not surprising since this is similar to the
real world

Which city is further west?

San Diego California or
Reno, Nevada?

San Diego is actually EAST

of Reno

San Diego is actually EAST

of Reno

Rotational Heuristic
-We tend to rotate maps to make
them more vertical or horizontal
-i.e., people rotate California.
Sketch a Mexican Map?

Which city is further north?

Philadelphia or Rome?

Philadelphia is actually further south than Rome!

We tend to line up the US and Europe in the same
latitude

Alignment Heuristic
-People tend to align
regions & images

Imagery and LTM

Bower & Winzenz (1970)
Subjects studied 30 paired-associates
-e.g., house-car, tree-moose
Three types of instructions:
1. Rehearse the word pairs
2. Form a sentence
3. Create interacting images

Bower & Winzenz (1970)

Results
Instructions % Recall
-------------------------------------------Rehearsal
37%
Sentence
77%
Imagery
87%
--------------------------------------------

Arguments against Imagery

Pylyshin (1973, 1979, 1981)

Experimenter Bias: Participants figure out what the

experimenter is looking for and perform accordingly
Task Demands: Task makes participants behave in a
particular manner (Transfer Appropriate..). If they are
doing imagery, they will treat it as imagery.
Tacit Knowledge: Participants use their implicit
knowledge. Analogical representation isn't
psychological real (100 miles take longer to travel
than 5 miles). They know this information
automatically, & they don't have to create images in
their heads.

Chambers & Reisberg

(1985)
-Showed subjects images could be
interpreted in two ways