Imagine being asked to picture a beach—the waves rolling in, the golden sand stretching beneath your feet.
Most people can summon at least a faint image in their mind. But for some, no matter how hard they try, the mental canvas remains blank.
This condition, known as aphantasia, has puzzled neuroscientists for years.
Now, new research suggests that while people with aphantasia may not consciously see mental images, their brains could still be generating them—just in a way that never reaches conscious awareness.
A groundbreaking study, published in Current Biology on January 10, suggests that people with aphantasia experience brain activity in the primary visual cortex—the part of the brain responsible for processing visual information—even when they try to visualize something.
Yet, somewhere along the line, these images appear to get “lost in translation,” never making it to conscious perception.
The study’s co-author, Joel Pearson, a professor of psychology at the University of New South Wales in Australia, described the phenomenon: “We don’t know yet, from these data, how it’s different, but we know that it’s different enough.”
In other words, the brain may still be producing the blueprints for mental imagery—it just never builds the full picture.
More Than Just a Blank Mind’s Eye
Aphantasia isn’t just about an inability to visualize; it also raises fascinating questions about how memory, perception, and cognition intertwine.
Previous studies have shown that people with aphantasia often have trouble recalling past experiences in a visual way, though they can still describe them in words.
Some even report differences in how they dream, with fewer or no visual elements at all.
To explore how the brain of someone with aphantasia processes visual information, researchers recruited 14 people with the condition and 18 people without it.
They employed a technique called binocular rivalry, where two different striped patterns—one red and one green—were flashed in front of the participants’ eyes.
Normally, the brain switches between the two images, struggling to merge them into a single picture.
But those with a strong “mind’s eye” could bias their perception by imagining one of the patterns beforehand, making it more likely to dominate when viewed.
The researchers found that those with aphantasia had significantly less ability to influence their perception this way.
“The stronger the [mental] imagery, the more likely it is to bias how they see the binocular rivalry pattern,” Pearson explained.
But for people with aphantasia, the effect was minimal, reinforcing the idea that their brains don’t process mental images in the typical way.
The Surprising Brain Activity of People with Aphantasia
Now, here’s where the study takes an unexpected turn: Even though people with aphantasia report not being able to form mental images, their brains still show activity in the primary visual cortex when they attempt to do so.
Using functional MRI (fMRI) scans, which track oxygenated blood flow as a measure of neural activity, the researchers observed an uptick in activity in the visual cortex when participants—both with and without aphantasia—were asked to imagine the striped patterns.
However, the study found a few key differences.
First, those with aphantasia showed slightly weaker brain activity even when directly perceiving the images, hinting at a fundamental difference in their visual processing.
Second, and even more intriguingly, the typical left-right mapping of visual information in the brain appeared to be flipped in those with aphantasia.
This suggests that their brains may be wired differently, which could explain why their mental images never reach conscious awareness.
Why Can’t They See the Images?
If brain activity related to imagery is still occurring in people with aphantasia, then why don’t they experience mental pictures?
To explore this, the researchers used machine learning algorithms trained to recognize patterns of brain activity.
These AI models could reliably predict what participants were seeing or imagining based on their neural signatures alone.
Surprisingly, in people without aphantasia, the brain activity for seeing and imagining overlapped so much that the algorithm often confused the two.
But in people with aphantasia, this overlap was absent—suggesting a fundamental disconnect between the signals being generated in the visual cortex and those reaching conscious awareness.
Pearson described the mystery like this: “It’s like a murder mystery or something. .
I’m hooked. I’ve got to find out what is this representation—there, in the visual cortex—and why is it unconscious?”
What Does This Mean for the Future of Aphantasia Research?
This study provides compelling evidence that mental imagery in aphantasia may not be completely absent—rather, it may be functioning in an altered or inaccessible way.
But as exciting as these findings are, the study is still relatively small.
Nadine Dijkstra, a senior research fellow at University College London’s Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging, who was not involved in the study, pointed out that the findings slightly contradict some previous research.
However, she noted that all studies so far suggest that the visual cortex is engaged differently in people with aphantasia, which may explain the lack of conscious imagery.
“This is a very new research field,” Dijkstra emphasized, “which means that a lot of questions are still unanswered.”
Aphantasia and the Nature of Consciousness
Beyond just helping us understand how aphantasia works, this study raises broader questions about how consciousness itself functions.
What does it mean to “see” something in the mind? Why are some mental images vivid, while others are inaccessible?
For now, aphantasia remains an intriguing cognitive mystery, one that challenges our assumptions about how human perception and memory operate.
While people with aphantasia may never “see” images in their mind’s eye, their brains might still be painting pictures—just on a canvas they can’t access.
As Pearson and his team continue their research, they may soon uncover the missing link that turns brain activity into conscious experience.
Until then, the enigma of aphantasia continues to stretch the limits of what we know about the human mind.
