Eye-Movement Reinstatement and Neural Reactivation: Testing the Hebbian Theory of Mental Imagery

Half a century ago, Donald Hebb posited that mental imagery is a constructive process that emulates perception. Specifically, Hebb claimed that visual imagery results from the reactivation of neural activity associated with viewing images. He also argued that neural reactivation and imagery benefit from the re-enactment of eye movement patterns that first occurred at viewing (i.e., fixation reinstatement). To investigate these claims, we applied multivariate pattern analyses to functional MRI (fMRI) and eye tracking data collected while healthy participants repeatedly viewed and visualized complex images. We observed that the specificity of neural reactivation correlated positively with vivid imagery and with detailed memory for the stimulus images. Moreover, neural reactivation correlated positively with fixation reinstatement - even when analyses were constrained to fMRI signal from the occipital lobe. These findings support the conception of mental imagery as a simulation of perception, and provide evidence of the supportive role of eye-movement in neural reactivation.