<p>People with <em>high verbal</em> thinking process almost all their thoughts in literal words.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>People with high verbal-linguistic intelligence display a facility with words and languages. They are typically good at reading, writing, telling stories and memorizing words along with dates.</p>
<p>— <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences#Linguistic-verbal" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Theory of multiple intelligences - Wikipedia</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>People with <em>aphantasia</em> recall almost all their experiences in literal words or generic concepts.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Aphantasia is the inability to voluntarily create mental images in one's mind.<br />
…<br />
The phenomenon was first described by Francis Galton in 1880 in a statistical study about mental imagery. Galton found it was a common phenomenon among his peers. He wrote:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>To my astonishment, I found that the great majority of the men of science to whom I first applied, protested that mental imagery was unknown to them, and they looked on me as fanciful and fantastic in supposing that the words 'mental imagery' really expressed what I believed everybody supposed them to mean. They had no more notion of its true nature than a colour-blind man who has not discerned his defect has of the nature of colour.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>— <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia#History" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Aphantasia - Wikipedia</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blake_Ross" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Blake Ross</a>, co-creator of Mozilla/Firefox, provides an excellent <a href="https://www.facebook.com/notes/2862324277332876/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">personal account of the condition</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>…<br />
If you tell me to imagine a beach, I ruminate on the “concept” of a beach. I know there’s sand. I know there’s water. I know there’s a sun, maybe a lifeguard. I know facts about beaches. I know a beach when I see it, and I can do verbal gymnastics with the word itself.</p>
<p>But I cannot flash to beaches I’ve visited. I have no visual, audio, emotional or otherwise sensory experience. I have no capacity to create any kind of mental image of a beach, whether I close my eyes or open them, whether I’m reading the word in a book or concentrating on the idea for hours at a time—or whether I’m standing on the beach itself.</p>
<p>And I grew up in Miami.<br />
…</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I would expect a high correlation between these two conditions, but I haven't been able to find anything significant that deals with both of them.</p>
<p>Have there been any studies along this line?</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-10-05T08:43:54.147Z
Thank you for including these sources. It shows what I also couldn't find during a cursory search and one of the reasons I asked for sources: where in these sources are your "almost all thoughts" and "almost all their experiences" claims stated? From reading the same text, I don't make that conclusion. I suggest you rephrase those claims as hypotheses and make explicit you derive them rom those sources.
Steven Jeuris
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-10-05T13:27:35.427Z
@StevenJeuris, Blake Ross describes it perfectly:
If you tell me to imagine a beach, I ruminate on the “concept” of a beach. I know there’s sand. I know there’s water. I know there’s a sun, maybe a lifeguard. I know facts about beaches. I know a beach when I see it, and I can do verbal gymnastics with the word itself.
¶ But I cannot flash to beaches I’ve visited. I have no visual, audio, emotional or otherwise sensory experience. I have no capacity to create any kind of mental image of a beach, ….
Ray Butterworth
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-10-05T13:55:18.250Z
I get that what you describe is _aphantasia_, but that doesn't address my concern. For the aphantasia claim you could write "Aphantasia is the inability to voluntarily create mental images in one's mind [source]. By exemption, I suspect this means they recall most of their experiences in literal words, as I know of no other ways of doing so." Notice how this makes your assumptions _explicit_. For your "high verbal thinking" claim I struggle to follow your thought pattern how you conclude that "[p]eople with high verbal thinking process almost all their thoughts in literal words."
Steven Jeuris
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-04-19T17:03:53.837Z
I’d suggest searching YouTube for Aphantasia Network videos. There are a number of researchers who have posted talks on the subject. The Aphantasia Network presents research and speakers on various related topics (there is a membership fee).
LJ1
<intelligence><thought><visualization><visual-memory><aphantasia>
Is there a correlation between high verbal thinking and aphantasia?
Ray Butterworth
# Is there a correlation between high verbal thinking and aphantasia?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2021-10-04)

People with *high verbal* thinking process almost all their thoughts in literal words.

> People with high verbal-linguistic intelligence display a facility with words and languages. They are typically good at reading, writing, telling stories and memorizing words along with dates.
>
> — [Theory of multiple intelligences - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences#Linguistic-verbal)

People with *aphantasia* recall almost all their experiences in literal words or generic concepts.

> Aphantasia is the inability to voluntarily create mental images in one's mind.  
> …  
> The phenomenon was first described by Francis Galton in 1880 in a statistical study about mental imagery. Galton found it was a common phenomenon among his peers. He wrote:
>
> > To my astonishment, I found that the great majority of the men of science to whom I first applied, protested that mental imagery was unknown to them, and they looked on me as fanciful and fantastic in supposing that the words 'mental imagery' really expressed what I believed everybody supposed them to mean. They had no more notion of its true nature than a colour-blind man who has not discerned his defect has of the nature of colour.
>
> — [Aphantasia - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia#History)

[Blake Ross](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blake_Ross), co-creator of Mozilla/Firefox, provides an excellent [personal account of the condition](https://www.facebook.com/notes/2862324277332876/):

> …  
> If you tell me to imagine a beach, I ruminate on the “concept” of a beach. I know there’s sand. I know there’s water. I know there’s a sun, maybe a lifeguard. I know facts about beaches. I know a beach when I see it, and I can do verbal gymnastics with the word itself.
>
> But I cannot flash to beaches I’ve visited. I have no visual, audio, emotional or otherwise sensory experience. I have no capacity to create any kind of mental image of a beach, whether I close my eyes or open them, whether I’m reading the word in a book or concentrating on the idea for hours at a time—or whether I’m standing on the beach itself.
>
> And I grew up in Miami.  
> …

I would expect a high correlation between these two conditions, but I haven't been able to find anything significant that deals with both of them.

Have there been any studies along this line?

**Tags:** intelligence, thought, visualization, visual-memory, aphantasia

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Thank you for including these sources. It shows what I also couldn't find during a cursory search and one of the reasons I asked for sources: where in these sources are your "almost all thoughts" and "almost all their experiences" claims stated? From reading the same text, I don't make that conclusion. I suggest you rephrase those claims as hypotheses and make explicit you derive them rom those sources.  
> **username_0**: @StevenJeuris, Blake Ross describes it perfectly: If you tell me to imagine a beach, I ruminate on the “concept” of a beach. I know there’s sand. I know there’s water. I know there’s a sun, maybe a lifeguard. I know facts about beaches. I know a beach when I see it, and I can do verbal gymnastics with the word itself. ¶ But I cannot flash to beaches I’ve visited. I have no visual, audio, emotional or otherwise sensory experience. I have no capacity to create any kind of mental image of a beach, ….  
> **username_1**: I get that what you describe is _aphantasia_, but that doesn't address my concern. For the aphantasia claim you could write "Aphantasia is the inability to voluntarily create mental images in one's mind [source]. By exemption, I suspect this means they recall most of their experiences in literal words, as I know of no other ways of doing so." Notice how this makes your assumptions _explicit_. For your "high verbal thinking" claim I struggle to follow your thought pattern how you conclude that "[p]eople with high verbal thinking process almost all their thoughts in literal words."  
> **username_2**: I’d suggest searching YouTube for Aphantasia Network videos. There are a number of researchers who have posted talks on the subject. The Aphantasia Network presents research and speakers on various related topics (there is a membership fee).  

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## 0 answers

