The eyes in imagery and perceptual processes: first remarks

Percept Mot Skills. 1992 Aug;75(1):287-90. doi: 10.2466/pms.1992.75.1.287.

Abstract

Through an echographic system we examined the activity of the crystalline lens of 10 men and women during real perceptual activity and during imagery. Subjects had to perceive near and far stimuli and to imagine reading a word on a page of a book (near imagined stimulus) or seeing a ship on the horizon (far imagined stimulus). Results showed that processes of accommodation (linked to the variations of the optical axis of the crystalline lens) occur in both real and imaginative conditions. The first results suggest an active role of the eye during imagery.

MeSH terms

  • Accommodation, Ocular / physiology
  • Adult
  • Arousal / physiology*
  • Distance Perception / physiology*
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Imagination / physiology*
  • Lens, Crystalline / physiology*
  • Male
  • Pattern Recognition, Visual / physiology*