Imagery and cognition

Imagery and Cognition

Learning and Imagery

Images play a role in everyday experience and in the formation of the educated

mind, in the learning of skills, concepts, attitudes, and values. Harry S.

Broudy (1987) advocates a program of education in several disciplines of art.

The arts in education are used to enrich the allusionary base through

associations and interpretations, rather than replications or applications. Arts

education must be teachable by the classroom teacher with the same degree of

competence demanded by the teaching of other required subjects. Imagery is

necessary in different types of learning: in problem solving, in value education

and in the learning of language.

Learning that and learning how. Typical situation is the replicative learning of

"knowing how" plus some "knowing that", consisting of: (1) a set of rules to

identify a task; (2) selection of the proper rule to be applied; (3) repetition

of the procedures. Life demands the ability of cognitive thinking, the ability

to generalize solutions, which depends on and is a measure of mental ability.

Learning why means the teaching of wholes, with the elements related to one

another in a meaningful way. Gestalt psychology discovered the patterns of

perception (we pattern the field of perception ourselves). The cognitive

learning theorists described the structures of knowledge and information

processing. Thinking ­ means developing the systems of ideas, recognizing

particulars, discerning patterns, relations and concepts which are shorthand

summaries of patterns of ideas. Hence comes the importance of imagery and

imagination in learning.

Feelingful knowledge and knowledgeful feeling. Our attitudes change our ways of

thinking and feeling. Cognitive feeling means also feelingful cognition. It is

the realm of aesthetics. Images are the sensory patterns. Not all sensory

experience yields image (e.g., pain). To create images of non-visual sense

qualities, one must use metaphors.

Imagery and achievement. Imagery is important in facilitating long-term

retention. Self-discovered imagery produce better retention than given imagery

or verbal definition. Pictures have the generalizing potential, as the complex

structure can be apprehended directly, e.g., the idea of holiness in the works

of art.

Imagery is the image-making function of the mind, forming patterns of feeling

from sensations. When do images become messages? The possibility of cognition is

born when the distinction is made between a signal and its referent (for

example, the rustle of leafs means danger). The relation of signals, symbols,

and signs to their referents are subject matters of thinking and judging. There

is the loose tie of a symbol or a sign to that for which it stands, to combine

images at will, to use language and think figuratively or metaphorically. Is the

imagined a clue to reality? If one imagine flying, one could manufacture wings?

Emancipation of the mind from the constraints of actuality release freedom with

no limitation, to create something that seems more that human, so is feared and

revered. What might be - ought to be, and ideals are born. Imagery plays a role

in explaining life. For art, what is being imaginative is virtually equated with

artistic creativity or artistic merit.

The allusionary base. Allusion is less precise than a reference. The allusionary

base is a stock of meanings with which we think and feel. It functions in the

learning of languages, skills, concepts and attitudes. The role of imagery in

learning is both direct and indirect. Imagery plays a direct role in our

perception of sounds, shapes, colors and motions that convey meaning. It plays

an indirect role when images influence language, concepts, values and ideals by

making an association. Imagery builds a matrix for reading comprehension, as it

provides the connotation of words and goes beyond denotation. Art deals with

images, some found in world, merely as denotations (photographs, for example)

expected to be connotative and having potential for satisfying or frustrating

some need.

Language and the allusionary base. The poverty of noneducated language results

from a lack of associative resources and a small power to make the cognitive

uses of language and generate connotations in response to linguistic signals.

Poetry, poetic uses of language depend on imagery for their effect; also slang,

and oratory.

Imagery and concept language. The name of a class of things is a concept.

Referring to the generic and differential properties of classes of objects makes

abstract thinking possible. Kant said that "concepts without percepts are empty;

percepts without concepts are blind." Are there possible natural sensory

meanings without concepts? Imageless thoughts? Is logic without sensory

perception elegant? In education, we use concepts with perceptible examples

(e.g. gravity) and metaphors.

Imagery and problem solving. Problem solving combines percepts and concepts,

particulars and universals, but also involve factors that go beyond. Imagery is

involved in interplay between them. How-to takes the place of how-to-because.

Personality Problems. Many students have distorted images who they are, what

they want to be, and what they are expected to be. School, parental, or

occupational adjustment embodies an aesthetic factor, a knowledge factor, a

skill factor, and a value factor. The aesthetic factor is the image one has of

himself or thinks other have, that he would like to create, the skill of

bringing it about, and the justification of it.

Aesthetic Exemplars of Value Education. How do people shape their value

schemata? Maybe, by providing a model, e.g., a person with a valuable

life-style. The direct appeal of the aesthetic image is at the root of

schooling, so whoever controls the images of value in a society also controls

the value education.

Aesthetic Education. Is aesthetic perception an aesthetic education? Aesthetic

literacy begins with learning to perceive the sensory, formal and expressive

properties of the aesthetic images. The skills of aesthetic perception include:

(1) perceiving sensory properties in the work (2) formal qualities (elements)

(3) technical merits (4) expressive significance or message as aesthetically

expressed.

Making an informed aesthetic response.

I. Aesthetic perception. The skills of aesthetic perception may be summarized as

perceiving the sensory properties, the formal qualities, the technical merits

and the expressive significance of the object or the work.

A. Sensory properties are shapes, lines, values, textures, colors, space, etc.

B. Formal properties tell how sensory properties are organized within an object

or event. Are all elements necessary? Sense of evolution, unity in variety,

hierarchy of elements, repetition, equilibrium, sense of balance, rhythmical

qualities, thematic variation.

C.Expressive properties reflect possible meanings of aesthetic object or event:

presentational (faces, trees, etc.) and/or metaphorical­symbolic characteristics

that evoke responses from one's storehouse of images and, when combined with

sensory and formal properties, translate into pervasive qualities, such as:

Mood language (somber, frivolous, etc.)

Dynamic states - arousing state of tension, conflict, relaxation, etc.,

Idea and ideal language - interpretation of events, beliefs and expressions.

D.Technical properties define how the object was created, for example how the

surface texture was created by an impasto application of paint.

II. Aesthetic criticism may be historical, recreative and judicial.

A. Historical criticism determines the nature and expressive intent of works of

art within their historical context and in relation to school, period, style and

culture.

B. Recreative criticism relates imaginatively to artist's expression.

C. Judicial criticism estimates the value of the work of art in relation to

other works using three criteria: degree of formal excellence, truth and

significance.

Mental Images in Human Cognition

How we come to know the external world? The cognitive science is a study of

intelligence and intelligent systems. People are behaving intelligently when

they choose courses of action that are relevant to achieving their goals, when

they reply coherently and appropriately to questions that are put to them, when

they solve problems, or when they create or design something useful or beautiful

or novel. Those activities have a common set of underlying processes.

Intelligence can be defined as the ability to perform intellectual tasks, and

can be studied from the behavior of intelligent organisms or intelligent

programs. A theory of intelligent processes or the computational principles can

be constructed on the basis of contributing disciplines concerned with

intelligence such as psychology (brain research, experimental psychology with

behaviorism, gestalt psychology, psychometrics, neuropsychology), artificial

intelligence (within computer science), linguistics and psycholinguistics,

philosophy and neuroscience.

Imagery and Brain

Mental imagery is a nonverbal, cognitive representation of objects and concepts.

It is contained within the right cerebral hemisphere (the posterior lobe). Human

cognition (including memory) is assumed to include separate but interconnected

verbal and imaginal systems. Methods for researching imagery are: physiological

recordings (e.g., cerebral blood flow, electroencephalography) and clinical

neuropsychology (e.g., split-brain patients), among others. According to

Kosslyn, visual imagery serves for generation, inspection, recoding,

maintenance, transformation of images.

Image generation. We do not have images all of the time. Images come and go,

through short-term memory representations. One can "mentally draw" in imagery,

producing images of patterns never actually seen.

Inspection: we must have a way of interpreting the patterns of images, 'zoom in'

on isolated parts of them, or scan across them.

Recoding: we can encode the patterns of images into memory, remember new

combinations of patterns or imaging new patterns.

Maintenance: images require effort to maintain. The more perceptual units that

are included in an image, the more difficult it is to maintain.

Transformation: lies at the heart of the use of imagery in reasoning. For

example, we can rotate patterns in images, including in the third dimension so

that we 'see' new portions as they come into view. We also can imagine objects

growing or shrinking.

Imagery and Perception

Is imagery a mirror of perception? Researchers examined the difference between

perception and imagery and postulated they were different processes. The visual

buffer activates visual mental images induced by stored information. Input from

the eyes induces a pattern of activation during perception. Imagery preserves

relations among external objects, not necessarily in a concrete way. For

example, corners of a square, or something in common with what went when a

square was previously experienced. Thus mental images help to compare objects.

Knowledge is important in imagery. Correspondence between imagery and perception

is due to tacit knowledge about physical relations in the world. Information

about objects is depicted and manipulated in a 'visual buffer' or working memory

­ a mental space for manipulating, scanning and inspecting visual images; we may

redraw maps from memory. Visual buffer has limited resolution, can be rotated

and scaled at will. It fades if not refreshed. It may take information from long

term memory or develop the 3D model representation in a long term memory

store.The attention window selects a region within the visual buffer for

detailed further processing. The size of the window in the visual buffer can be

altered. In addition, the location of the attention window in the visual buffer

can be shifted. People can scan visual mental images, even when their eyes are

closed, and the farther they scan across the imaged object, the more time is

required. We can scan to portions of objects that initially were 'off screen'.

The temporary, working memory components are: a central executive (reasoning,

decision making, coordinating) and two subsidiary systems: visuo-spatial

scratchpad for images and articulatory loop for verbal materials. Memory is

better for concrete materials than abstract materials, and is better with the

use of visual imagery. The retention of visual and spatial material functions in

separate systems. Recall is better after imagery than after verbal instructions,

best after interactive imagery instructions. When people compare sizes of

objects, pictures work better than verbal comparisons. Mental representations of

visual objects may be unconscious computations of moving objects and conscious

knowledge of meaning of the object. Kosslyn provided successfully working

computer model of the cognitive processes involved in visual imagery.

Visual thinking

Thinking is a set of mental activities involved in the manipulation of

representations, some from imagery, some from more abstract representational

systems. Definition of thinking hinges on the notion of the long term (permanent

knowledge) and transient representations (new information). It provides the

construction of new information which can enter into an individual's knowledge

base. Images are mental models for thinking. Visual thinking connects the visual

and thinking: it is generation and manipulation of images. There is an

opposition between Symbolist theories (thinking occur in mental symbols) and

Conceptualist theories (mental symbols are products of thinking about conceptual

and abstract entities). Imagery is efficient in learning the data. People can

mentally combine geometric forms in a visual image and make discoveries.

Imagery involves representational processes to evoke properties of objects.

Images are cognitive reflections and notations of a real world. This is

important in spatial information. Non-spatial info can be translated into

spatial metaphors. Symbolic, more abstract imagery may be used as well as

simulation imagery, e.g., time-based graphs. Imagery is often relied on

intuition. Thus, imagery is used to represent concrete objects, spatial

information in form of mental maps, metaphorically non­spatial relations or

processes (e.g., comparative judgments), or to mentally picture highly abstract

information (with cognitive effort). Aristotle, Cicero, then contemporary

researchers linked imagery and memory for processing verbal material, thus

producing two memory codes. Performing the actions improves memory as compared

with learning the phrases and imaginal actions. When one moves, there is optical

flow of objects, with continuous updating. Distance and orientation of objects

in blindfolded movement demonstrate subjects' ability to form a visual image of

space (to locate the targets after displacement). Visuo-spatial concept-based

perception in chess helps the masters to 'see' good moves. A fluency of thought

(time needed to generate one move) differs among skilled and moderately skilled

players. Visuo-spatial working memory is a very central processing system in

chess players' thinking and the locus of players' advanced calculations.

Language is sequential. Descriptions of mental images enable people to express

their internal states, convey mental representations of objects absent from

people's environments. Bizarre images improve memory when shown in the context

of common events, and through the visual imagery. When mental construction was

made with and without paper-and-pencil verbal presentation of figures, visual

processing resulted in fewer failures and more good figures. People work

surprisingly well with mental images only, but for harder tasks external

representation support is of great importance.

As a summary, visual imagery is used to help one recall information about

previously perceived objects and events, to reason about visual and spatial

properties of objects, and to learn new information. Visual imagery may

facilitate problem solving, as it provides flexible representation of the

cognitive task, allows subjects to avoid the mechanical use of algorithms

elicited by verbal formulation of the problem, promotes parallel processing of

information (not to examine single elements sequentially), and may hint at

dynamic transformations. For those reasons, mental visualization allow subjects

to avoid obstacles to productive thinking and transform problem situations in

unusual but productive way.

Based on:

Harry S. Broudy (1987). The Role of Imagery in Learning. Occasional Paper 1, The

Getty Center for Education in the Arts.

Cornoldi, C., & McDaniel, M. A., Eds., (1991). Imagery and Cognition. New York

et al., Springer-Verlag.

Logie, R. H., & Denis, M., Eds., (1991) Second Workshop on Imagery and

Cognition, Padua, Italy. Advances in Psychology Series #80, Amsterdam, New York,

Oxford, Tokyo: North Holland, Elsevier Science Publishers B.V.

Posner, M. I., (1993). Foundations of Cognitive Science. A Bradford Book.The MIT

Press: Cambridge, Massachusetts; London, England.