The enigmatic eidetic image: A critical examination of methods, data, and theories.

Abstract

Eidetic imagery, widely but mistakenly known as photographic memory, has been studied for decades with a picture-description technique. Heavily dependent on subjects' reports of vivid images, this method has produced widely varying estimates of the prevalence of eidetikers, inconsistent reports of eidetikers' accuracy, and evidence that eidetic images in fact resemble visual memory images as much as they resemble perceptual images. Objective methods, which involve superimposing eidetic images, have only produced additional confusion. Theoretical accounts of eidetic imagery include: Jaensch's comprehensive, but largely unsubstantiated, ontogenetic theory; the view that eidetic imagery is a primitive, concrete mnemonic system; the notion that it is a symptom of psychosis or of brain injury; and the possibility that it reflects abnormal perceptual functioning. No theory has proved to be satisfactory. In addition, there are two major viewpoints concerning eidetic imagery and other perceptual-cognitive abilities. The more popular view is that eidetic imagery is unique; the other view, which suggests that eidetic imagery differs from other types of visual imagery in degree only, not in kind, seems to provide the more promising approach.

Subjective Experience: Its Conceptual Status, Method of Investigation, and Psychological Significance

“…When a picture stimulus is scanned for 30 s (and the picture then removed), about 5% of primary school children (Richardson & Harris, 1986) and an estimated 0.1 % of adolescents and adults will report that the picture (or at least parts of it) can be seen on the objectively blank projection mat. Though Morsh and Abbott (1945) believed that this phenomenon was merely an after-image, and Gray and Gummerman (1975) argued that it was no more than an especially vivid thought (memory) image, Haber (1979) insisted that the criteria used rule out these possibilities.…”

Interdependent Concepts and their Independent Uses: Mental Imagery and Hallucinations

“…Multiple conflicting proposals for the relationship between eidetic images and other SLMP were presented. Most commonly considered a unique type of SLMP, eidetic imagery was also proposed to be a form of SLMP that differed from ordinary imagery simply by degree (Gray and Gummerman 1975). In both proposals, the high degree of perceptual similarity was explained as useful during the developmental stages of childhood; eventually being replaced by abstract thought in normal adults (e.g., Allport 1924).…”

Insights from the animal kingdom

“…There is some controversy about whether this type of memory even exists (Minsky, 1998). Studies supporting it show that it is more common in children than adults and occurs among normal children with some frequency (Gray & Gummerman, 1975). Some researchers believe that children lose these memory abilities as their brains develop perhaps as they shift from more right brain intuitive thinking to more left brain rational, cognitive thinking (Haber, 1979).…”