Mental Imagery in Aesthetic Appreciation and the Understanding of the Self and Others

Mental imagery refers to the ability to generate images in the "mind's eye" in the absence of external stimulation (i.e., quasi-percepts), which allows us to conflate past and current events with imaginary futures in the ongoing narratives of ourselves. As such, mental imagery is likely to be associated with prosociality, emotional self-awareness, and aesthetic experiences, but empirical evidence is still limited. Experiment 1 examined if differences in styles of mental imagery were associated with social cognition and emotional self-awareness, while Experiment 2 examined if those imagery styles were associated with the aesthetic appreciation of visual forms of art. The findings showed that object-oriented imagery was associated with prosocial traits (empathy and the ability to be transported into fictional worlds), but not with perspective taking. Spatial-oriented imagery was associated with an increased difficulty describing one's own feelings, while verbal-oriented imagery was associated with a better understanding of one's own feelings. Visual styles of imagery (object, spatial) predicted some of the variation in the aesthetic appreciation of photographs (but not paintings), and such relationship was moderated by the vividness of the imagery (but not by art experience). Conversely, art experience (but not vividness) was a moderator of the appreciation of paintings, but only in individuals with a weak object-oriented imagery. The results point to reliable associations of mental imagery with prosociality and emotional self-awareness and support a role for imagery in fine-tuning the aesthetic appreciation of visual art, and in inner simulations underpinning an adaptive imagination.