Interactive Auditory and Visual Images in Persons Who Are Totally Blind

Mental imagery can be a powerful aid for human memory. In particular, memory is enhanced by the creation of an interactive image: a single complex image that includes two or more items linked together. For example, to remember the words whale and cigar, a person can produce an image of a whale with a cigar in its mouth (Paivio, Clark, & Khan, 1988; Paivio, Walsh, & Bons, 1994). Some studies (see, for example, Jonides, Kahan, & Rozin, 1975) have found that a similar strategy improves the memory of people who are blind. That is, people who are blind can use images that have the essential characteristics of visual objects, such as properties of shape and location in space. The images do not contain typical attributes unique to visual objects, such as color or brightness (Carpenter & Eisenberg, 1978; De Beni & Cornoldi, 1988), but they seem to contain characteristics of objects that could be processed to enhance memory.