An fMRI investigation on image generation in different sensory modalities: The influence of vividness

Primary somatosensory cortex discriminates affective significance in social touch

“…However, the SI modulation is foreshadowed by a change in activity pattern, detectable by using multivoxel pattern classification in the 4 s preceding the likely onset of the caress. The visually triggered modulation of touch showed trial-by-trial correlation with pleasantness ratings and was significant within SI but not in the insula or ACC, areas previously thought to mediate this effect (14,15,63), and it seems to be independent of the modulation in the OFC, as suggested by a lack of functional connectivity between OFC and SI in our experiment. By showing that SI, a region classically associated with the processing of sensory properties of touch, has activity correlated with pleasantness, our data suggest that sensory and affective properties of touch are processed by partially overlapping neural systems.…”

“…Activation in SI in the absence of touch has also been observed in highly empathic individuals that experience mirror-touch synesthesia (60,61). SI activation has also been observed in the absence of touch during hypnotic suggestion (19), while participants recognize visually presented shapes (57), while monkeys view patterns that have been associated with tactile stimuli (62), and while participants imagine being touched (63,64). Finally, SI activation patterns have also been shown to differ while observing other individuals haptically explore different objects (42) or be caressed (16).…”

Using Neuroeducation as a Model to Evaluate the Effect of Imagery on Chinese Character Writing

“…It might be that visual imagery produced semantic representations, or vice versa, which access visual information (including faces or words) stored in long-term memory (Kosslyn, 1994). The propositional theory is consistent with the report that mental manipulation of an object is harder than processing physical pictures of an identical object, presumably due to cognitive load from extensive brain areas that require more top-down projections (see Klemen & Chambers, 2012;Olivetti Belardinelli et al, 2009;Wimmer et al, 2016).…”

“…According to this theory, to generate visual images, higher-level processing is required to recruit brain areas overlapping with the language circuitry (Kosslyn & Thomapson, 2003). Evidence was shown in several neuroimaging studies, indicating that semantic representations, or at least some verbal components, are implicated in the imagery process (Mazard et al, 2005;Olivetti Belardinelli et al, 2009). For example, Mazard et al (2005) found that imagery elicited significantly stronger activation in the left inferior frontal (important for verbal comprehension and production) and left inferior temporal gyrus (responsible for visual object recognition) than perceptual processes.…”

“…Among the limited data on the neuronal object generation and maintenance (e.g., D'Esposito et al, 1997; Kosslyn, 1994;Mazard et al, 2005;Olivetti Belardinelli et al, 2009), research from the brain lesion studies has generally supported the coexistence of two pathways for imagery processing. These are the parietal pathway (known as the dorsal pathway) for spatial representation (e.g., Driver & Mattingley, 1998) and the temporal pathway (knowns as the ventral pathway) for processing visual properties of objects, such as size, shape, color, etc., (see Anderson, 2010;Goodale, Milner, Jakobson, & Carey, 1991).…”