The main question of whether aphantasia is a memory problem or a visual problem suggests that both problems are mutially exclusive and in my opinion this is not demonstrated in the article. The question, dare I say, feels not much more then empty semantics. Defining something as a … problem also becomes very confusing when you don’t make it clear if you are referring to the cause or the effect of something.
Key points analysis:
The meaning of the word aphantasia in the article is also confusing as it is used in multiple ways. In the first sentence in the below picture it is defined as nothing more then an inability. This definition says nothing of the underlying cause(s) of that inability. But in the 2nd sentence it is used as a name for the cause of this inability and other inabilities.
The last sentence is interesting as in the New Neuroscience Article on Aphantasia basically the opposite is claimed:
While aphantasics accurately perceive elements of reality and show no deficits in memory or language processing.
If 2 studies report fundamentally different conclusions regarding the same topic as appears to be the case above, it raises the question in my view how much trust one should give to any similar scientific study and whether there is a better way to do research on similar topics.
Some in my view more confusing parts of the article:
Half of people with aphantasia report a diminished ability to imagine information from other senses as well.
The more I look at this sentence, the more questions it raises. If only 4% of the population has aphantasia, it would be reasonable to assume that they have specifically asked people with this condition to take part in the investigation. This raises the question if the people they end up with are representative of the full spectrum of the alledged 4%. I would expect that the extreme cases would be over-represented as they are more likely to be aware of their condition. Based on a possible standard normal distribution of abilities, it is reasonable to assume that half the population has diminished abilities of any kind. The reported inabilities all seem quite vague in terms of severity.
And then it continues:
They cannot, for example, generate the sound of a song in their mind, or mentally conjure the smell of a rose.
Are they suggesting that half the people with aphantasia cannot do the above things at all or only some of them? I don’t understand what is actually being claimed here. And what about the people that do not report that they have aphantasia, how many of them report not being able to mentally conjure the smell of a rose?
My overall view of studies like this one is that the data that comes out of it is so vague and unreliable and the terminology is used in such a flexible way that I don’t see how this leads to any kind of foundation that would be helpfulll for further research.
I’m looking foreward to anyone with a different (or similar) view on the matter.
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