ArticleHuman brain mapping2024
Working memory signals in early visual cortex are present in weak and strong imagers.
Article in Human brain mapping, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed.
- Sensory reformatting for a working visual memory.Trends in cognitive sciences · 2025Review
- The neural underpinnings of aphantasia: a case study of identical twins.Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) · 2025Article
- Article
- The Neural Underpinnings of Aphantasia: A Case Study of Identical Twins.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Ocular working memory signals are flexible to behavioral priority and subjective imagery strength.Journal of neurophysiology · 2024Article
- Uncovering the Role of the Early Visual Cortex in Visual Mental Imagery.Vision (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- Working memory signals in early visual cortex are present in weak and strong imagers.Human brain mapping · 2024Article
- Sensory modality- and load-dependent changes across cortical working memory representations.Imaging neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.)Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
It has been suggested that visual images are memorized across brief periods of time by vividly imagining them as if they were still there. In line with this, the contents of both working memory and visual imagery are known to be encoded already in early visual cortex. If these signals in early visual areas were indeed to reflect a combined imagery and memory code, one would predict them to be weaker for individuals with reduced visual imagery vividness. Here, we systematically investigated this question in two groups of participants. Strong and weak imagers were asked to remember images across brief delay periods. We were able to reliably reconstruct the memorized stimuli from early visual cortex during the delay. Importantly, in contrast to the prediction, the quality of reconstruction was equally accurate for both strong and weak imagers. The decodable information also closely reflected behavioral precision in both groups, suggesting it could contribute to behavioral performance, even in the extreme case of completely aphantasic individuals. Our data thus suggest that working memory signals in early visual cortex can be present even in the (near) absence of phenomenal imagery.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.