Thought Extramission: The Eyes Project Conceptual Maps at Close Distance

Abstract

When individuals think of objects or visual scenes in the absence of perceptual stimuli, they picture them on a virtual canvas, also known as "the minds eye". What is currently unknown is the extent to which appraisals of imaginary objects are adaptive to contextual factors. Here, we present evidence that the eyes project imaginary objects in peripersonal space, that wearing sunglasses interferes with their projection, and that wearing a bicycle cap triggers emotional compensatory responses. Moreover, we show that maintaining a specific egocentric distance in the minds eye generates poor scaling of object similarity to object size, possibly due to an ego-allocentric computational overload. As a result, object representations are often retrieved from long-term memory only partially, with optimal representations requiring a perfectly still egocentric framework. We conclude that, like visual perception, mental imagery is adaptive to contextual factors with two important differences, namely external image projections and poor image resolution under load. We argue that these differences result from imagery being fully dependent on conscious computations and less on automatic processes.