Afantasia: ‘I can’t see my children in my thoughts’ – 04/08/2024 – Balance

Most people can visualize images in their head — what an apple looks like, what their kitchen looks like, or their best friend’s smile — but not everyone.

And those who can’t are likely among the top 1% of people with extreme aphantasia, according to a review of studies on the phenomenon.

They are also less likely to recognize faces, remember the sound of music or the noise of sandpaper, and more likely to work in science, mathematics or computer science.

It is believed that up to 6% of the population may experience some degree of aphantasia.

It is not a disorder and does not mean a lack of imagination, but it can have subtle effects on everyday life, says Professor Adam Zeman, honorary professor of neurology at the University of Exeter, who coined the term almost 10 years ago.

British Mary Wathen, 43, finds it “mind-blowing” that other people can create images in their heads.

“I just can’t understand what they really mean. Where is this image and what does it look like?” he asks.

“For me, if you can’t see something with your eyes, it doesn’t exist.”

Mary cannot visualize important events in her life, such as her wedding day. And unless they are with her, Mary also cannot bring to mind the image of her two sons.

“It doesn’t come with an image—I have all the memories, I just remember them very differently,” says Mary.

“As someone once described it, all the hardware is working, but the monitor is not turned on.”

‘Instinct’

Mary discovered that she was different from most other people when she talked to friends.

She was surprised to discover that her husband could easily visualize past events, as if he were watching a movie.

The positive side, she says, is that she is a great verbal communicator, because she doesn’t assume anything — what matters are the words. She also feels things deeply.

“I’m a very emotional person, driven by instincts — so when I remember something, it’s a feeling rather than an image,” says Mary.

Mind maps have never been a useful tool for exams, for example, and fantasy fiction doesn’t work because she can’t access that universe in her mind.

“I only see what’s real and in front of me—it doesn’t matter if I saw it a minute ago or an hour ago,” says Mary.

Opposite extreme

Professor Zeman discovered this way of experiencing the world when he treated a patient who had lost the ability to visualize.

When he wrote about the patient’s case, other people got in touch to say they had always lived like this.

Zeman has since discovered that there is an opposite extreme, hyperfantasy, in which people see images so vivid in their heads that they can’t tell whether they are real or imagined. It is estimated that 3% of us see the world this way.

“One term gave rise to the other,” he says, after borrowing Aristotle’s word for the mind’s eye: “fantasy.”

Professor Zeman says that 17,000 people have contacted him in the last decade reporting experiences of aphantasia and hyperphantasia.

Many said they knew they processed information differently than other people, but could not describe how.

In dreams

Differences in connectivity between brain regions may explain why, says Professor Zeman.

When asked to imagine an apple, for example, most people go through a succession of steps, including “teasing” the brain to remember what an apple looks like and triggering the brain to create an image of it.

But in those with aphantasia, this process may fail at some of the stages.

“Thoughts remain thoughts,” says Zeman, “while for others, thought translates into sensory terms.”

While aphantasics think about memories, other people are able to recall and live those memories.

But, interestingly, many aphantasics are able to visualize images while dreaming — probably because it is a more spontaneous task, which begins deep in the brain, says Zeman.

And aphantasia can bring benefits. It may have a protective effect on mental health, because those with aphantasia are more likely to live in the moment and are less likely to imagine scary or stressful events, for example.

“The big surprise” for Zeman, however, was the aphantasic artists, who said that the struggle to visualize images gave an extra incentive to make art, making the canvas the mind’s eye.

It’s the hyperfantasics like Geraldine van Heemstra, however, who are typically most likely to be creative.

Geraldine, an artist, always had a “giant imagination” as a child, building “entire cities” in her head.

And she always saw the alphabet in colors, as well as numbers and days of the week.

At school, Geraldine used to change the answers to math problems because the colors of the numbers in her head looked wrong when placed side by side.

But she discovered that she saw the world differently than most other people just by collaborating with musicians and dancers, painting swirls and shapes in response to their rhythms.

Feeling of being transported

“I remember asking musicians how they saw the music — but they didn’t understand what I meant,” says Geraldine.

“I thought all musicians saw notes in color.”

Geraldine has a similarly intense experience painting.

“I can walk, draw, contemplate the landscape and relive the experience later,” she says.

Even though she is planning to do something, Geraldine feels transported to the future.

“I could be going the other way and it will be like déjà vu,” she says.

But constant viewing can also be tiring.

And Geraldine’s brain can sometimes become overloaded, making it difficult to sleep.

Many questions remain about aphantasia and hyperphantasia, like what the different subtypes are and why it might be a genetic thing.

Data from large biological information banks may provide the answer.

Inner lives

The review, published in Trends in Cognitive Sciences, found that aphantasia runs in families, with siblings of those with aphantasia being 10 times more likely to also be affected.

It has also been thought that aphantasics are more likely to have autism.

Professor Zeman says the research suggests that “conscious sensory imagery is not a prerequisite for human cognition” — or creative imagination.

And everyone visualizes images in their minds differently.

“Our experience is not the norm and other people may have different inner lives,” he adds.