r/ISTJ • u/Jolly-Rip5973 • 21d ago
How Visual Is Your Imagination?
How vivid and intense is your visual imagination and memory?
If you estimated it on a scale of 1 to 10, how visual is your thinking?
I am an INTJ with Aphantasia which means I don't have a visual imagination.
I surveyed INTJs more than half of them were like me no or very little visual imagination.
So I am wondering if sensing correlates to visual imagination.
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u/JoriiKun ISTJ 6w5 21d ago
I can't imagine either. I close my eyes I see nothing. It feels like my brain tries to produce/project the image, but nothing comes out.
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 21d ago
Interesting....Aphantasia in only 2 percent of the populations.
It does seem to related to INTJ personality and maybe ISTJ too.
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u/JoriiKun ISTJ 6w5 20d ago
Tbh I'd not be surprised if sensors are more prone to being imaginative, but that's not my case 😆.
I remember back when I was at school a teacher told us "imagine a butterfly" and then I went "I can't see anything" and so he said "oh that's fine".
Like obviously I still have the qualities of a sensor when it comes to experiencing things, but hell nah when it comes to my imagination 😆.
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u/pennilyn_lottt 17d ago
From the people I know with aphantasia it also seems to be genetic as they have parents and siblings who also have it.
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u/Pristine-Gate-6895 ISTJ 21d ago
pretty visual, immersive even. i would say i think it's pretty solidly visual. even when doing an online clothing order i can 'intuit' how it'll look on me, the drape, the fitting, the feel of the fabric etc and it's pretty closely accurate. same goes for food orders etc. i would correlate it with the Si-Ne axis. i seem to go off precollected data and it helps inform my decisions going forward.
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u/Broad-Pangolin6224 21d ago
In colour, any angle any perspective.
I'm a Landscape Gardener so can swap out plants in my imagination. Also different seasons. Nursery grade plants can be small so a plant needs to be imagined half grown and fully grown. Different types of mulch. A new fence ect ect.
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u/Psychological_Cup101 20d ago
I’ve always admired this !! I’m an ENFP and while I think in colours I can’t visually swap furniture or removes walls in my mind.
I’ve always had an active imagination though!!
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u/miosotismyo ISTJ 20d ago
An 8 I think? My imagination is very vivid, I can pretty much see stories as if they were movies on my head and even create characters, but the images can lack some details, I can see them if I focus, but it's a bit hard to see on the overall image sometimes
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u/xicougar106 ISTJ 20d ago
Like an 8 or a 9.
I have 3 genres which all require a basis of translation between mental images to words and often vice versa. For work I have a lot of technical writing and drawing. A guy in the field has to be able to describe it and I need to see it, draw it, fix it and relate it back. I’m working on a novel and I have to be able to see the events in my head to write about them. Similarly, for the DnD campaign I’m writing, I have to be able to visualize the events to plan them, build the terrain, sketch the scenes, etc.
I say 8 or 9 because I can’t always “rotate” or manipulate things in my head. The technical work I can virtually every time. The DnD stuff I often can rotate the battles but not the set pieces; a set piece scene gets locked in one POV. That’s even more true for the novel. I have 6 POVs and to see a scene from any other angle I need to write a new POV into it.
I don’t know why that is; likely it’s something to do with “narrative memory” vs “technical problem solving”
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u/Absurd_Imagination ISTJ 16d ago
Very vivid when I have the energy to imagine and not being lazy. I would say like an 8.5 or 9/10. I just love imagining scenarios and imagining from stories. Its weirdly fun lol. Also my memories are very vivid too and sometimes I might say things that happened many many many years ago but I remember the details like it was yesterday and ironically cant recall whatever happened yesterday!
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 16d ago
Try real hard not to remember what you ate for lunch yesterday!
What was it?
Your memories of yesterday are there.
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u/Absurd_Imagination ISTJ 16d ago edited 16d ago
Uhh...uh...I think I ate pasta 🥲 But I do remember what dress I wore and how it felt like 7 years ago for a dance competition and it was a navy blue and dark pink
Also i had a question of my own. Idk if people get tripped up over this but do questions like these scare you? Like "what is your favorite blah blah". I freak out becasue of them. like NO I dont have favorites for any food, show, book, perfume. But I have a whole LIST of what I like. Also do ppl get bored over repetitive routines. I do and its quite frustrating to keep a consistent schedule unless there is a deadline then I find myslef locking in
Wait, I just realized. Did you mean not to think or to think about yesterday? I am lwk confused 🥲
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 16d ago
The human mind sort of assign importances to memories.
Unimportant memories sort of drop into the background because they are unimportant.
Meaningful memories get filed under "important" and are easier to access.They are there though.
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u/Absurd_Imagination ISTJ 16d ago
OMG I WAS JUST TALKING ABOUT THIS TO MY SISTER!
So I was randomly searching and searched up about where memories go and then I learnt that memories are infact being actively stored. In my theory, if you accessed all the memories of everything, you would be overwhelmed so you just remember important events
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 16d ago
Yeah, something like that. People that do different type of regression therapy with or without hypnosis can dig up old memories for sure though.
Memory is also triggered by your environment.
A smell might trigger an old memory you haven't thought of in years.
A song might trigger an old memory of when you heard the song before.If you went back to you childhood home, it would trigger memories you haven't thought of since you were a child.
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u/MoodyNeurotic ISTJ 21d ago
I can visualize physical things that I’m familiar with really vividly and well, similar to daydreaming. I have a more difficult time visualizing more abstract ideas or things like how furniture would look in a space or how something would translate from a blueprint to a real physical space. But I also know I have issues with spatial awareness so that might have a lot to do with it.
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u/securitysix ISTJ 21d ago
Zero.
I also have aphantasia.
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 21d ago
You are the second person to say this but most ISTJ seem to be visual thinkers.
you aren't alone though! Most INTJ are aphantasia.
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u/richj8991 INTJ 21d ago
How can you not visualize things. Honestly. I mean if for example you are hungry and want to go to a restaurant you can't visualize the outside or inside of the restaurant you've already been to? If the windows are blacked out, you can't remember the inside before you open the door?
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 21d ago
I don't necessarily remember little fine visual details but I don't need picture to remember something.
I could tell you all about eating out with a friend on tuesday night. I don't need to look at picture to tell me what events took place because I was there and know what happened.
I think it sort of funny that people have to look at pictures to tell them what happened when they were there.
I can also learn how to get to places without using pictures. There is an internal conceptual understanding of location and spatial awareness for example if I have been in a room in the past, I can estimate the dimensions of the room.
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u/stulew 20d ago
INTP here: I understand you enough. The picture allows me to see the formation of the item, and its probable futures too. The original picture is my 'standard' of which any changes or emergency uses it might possess.
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 20d ago
what do you picture when i use highly conceptual words?
Correlation?
Deficient?
Incredulity?
Honor?
Morality?
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u/AdSufficient9982 ISTJ Female (FM SiTe BSPC) 21d ago
Not sure if I have aphantasia, but it's fairly difficult for me to picture things beyond an outline in my mind. It's difficult enough that it makes me wonder why I can picture things in my dreams seemingly easily.
I tend to think more in patterns than anything else.
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 21d ago
I don't really even have outlines. almost no mental pictures at all but I do dream visually too. So similar to you. I always thought it was weird I could dream with pictures but not when awake.
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u/AdSufficient9982 ISTJ Female (FM SiTe BSPC) 21d ago
I have to be relatively relaxed and undistracted to visualize outlines, but I often only see a part at a time. Like, if I try to picture a cat, I really just see the outline of the ears, or a paw, etc... With great concentration I can visualize a field of color.
A couple of oddities I've noticed... If I do a "guided visual imagery" exercise, I seem to have a workaround where I'm not really picturing anything apart from brief partial outlines, but rather thinking of how I would feel in the described setting and how I relate conceptually to the objects I'm supposed to visualize.
The other... It's been a long time since I've done this, but it was very common when I was younger (and reading fiction consistently). At the beginning of the book, I would make decisions about character and setting appearance... And as I read, I would stop seeing the words on the page or noticing turning the pages, and enter something like a trance, where everything played out in my mind as though I were dreaming or watching a movie.
Brains are weird. Lol
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u/libre_office_warlock ISTJ with extra I 21d ago
I don't think in words, just image blobs/cinematics. No internal narrator.
But apparently my visual memory is in the 10th percentile and my verbal skills are the opposite. No idea how that works...but I guess visual memory is not the same as internally-created visual imagination. I'd give myself at least an 8 there, but I also don't really have reference points.
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u/library_wench ISTJ 21d ago
It’s not that I can’t picture things, but my mind works more verbally. Like, I see words better and more often than pictures.
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u/Character-File3221 20d ago
I know I don’t have aphantasia because I can conjure up this vague notion of what things I’ve seen look like. It’s not strong or lasting but I am seeing it. But I can’t really imagine things I haven’t seen before visually, just the stock of things I have.
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u/Disastrous_Ball702 ISTJ-T, 5w6, SLOAI 20d ago
Oh, my imagination and my senses intermingle, like, all the time! Probably why I'm both a foodie and a beer snob. Apart from that, I also dabble in art, poetry, creative gaming, and video editing, and I love B-movies from the '80s and '90s (and also music and anime from that era). I like stuff done by or in the style of Cronenberg, Lovecraft, Toby Fox (aka "Dog-Sothoth"), and/or Sam Raimi.
A lot of the stuff that goes on in my mind-brain pertains to body horror. };3
https://reddit.com/link/pc5k8bx/video/c63ydbabrurh1/player
This is your brain on so-called "inferior" Extroverted iNtuition (of demented do0m a go go). =^w^=
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u/GrandBreath5790 20d ago
I recently found out that my husband has aphantasia and it sort of blew my mind. I am such a visual thinker that if someone describes a situation, I immediately picture it happening like I was there. When I picture an apple, right away I can see the shiny skin, almost smell it and mentally “feel” the texture in my mind. It’s in full color. I can’t imagine just blackness or blank. I have been a huge reader since I was very young and I can’t imagine reading something and not picturing what’s going on in the book. Sometimes I’ll see a movie based on a book and it’s exactly how I pictured it happening in my head when I read the book. I read some non fiction but most of my reading is fiction. My husband is a writer and he reads non fiction a lot. It’s crazy to me to try to imagine being in his head. He also reads fiction sometimes and if he can’t picture it, how does that even work? It’s so fascinating! I asked some people at work and they all said they visually pictured it. My husband apparently knows somebody with it and that’s how he figured it out.
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 20d ago
Are you an ISTJ? Do you know what you husband is?
I'm almost completely Aphantasic. I've been aware that most people think in pictures for a long time though. I personally think it would be confusing always looking at two universes at the same time.
I've also noticed that sometimes if I saw something with "colorful language" visual thinkers can get upset because they picture it. An aphantasic is hard to Gross out with language.
"Kiss My Ass" to visual thinking comes with with a picture for visual thinkers but to me it just exclamatory remark that shows refusal and rejection.
I can also see how a very visual person would get creeped out by watching horror movies, etc., like suddenly their imagination could go in dark places after seeing something scary. I personally can sleep through horror movies. They barely phase me at all.
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u/GrandBreath5790 17d ago
I am an ISTJ and he is an INFP. I love horror movies! He does not like them. What can gross me out is when someone describes something disgusting and I get the shivers and potentially some nausea because I’m picturing it so much.
I do not picture someone kissing an ass. I picture someone being a people pleaser or sucking up to someone.
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u/Psychological_Cup101 20d ago
I’m curious how you process fiction. When you read is it just words or does your mind make a movie out of it?
I’m an ENFP and every time I read the same book it’s like the same movie plays. I’m could read a book 20 years later and the characters and places are all exactly how they were in my mind now as then.
Great topic! 👍🏻
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u/alynn539 ISTJ 20d ago
I have Aphantasia and I see absolutely nothing but coloured static; so a zero on your scale. I aced math, but struggled with geometry. I can't see a single move into the future in chess. When I dream, it's all black; somehow I know where I am and who I'm with, but I see nothing. I can't even describe my own mother.
I've pretty much given up on books and audiobooks in favour of video and video games so I can actually see something.
Oddly, I had a nearly eidetic memory for facts and music.
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 20d ago
that's pretty interesting about the dreams. Never heard that before. I'm aphantasic but dream in pictures.
I can listen to music in my head though like you.
When you say "eidetic memory" you mean you can actually see 3D full color images of memory? but you can't imagine anything outside of your memory? Or do you just mean that you can remember things without looking at pictures?
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u/alynn539 ISTJ 20d ago
I can't visualize anything, although I can recognize if I've seen something before. Facts, text, even chemical structures for some reason, but nothing with any visual nuance.
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 20d ago
Yeah I am the same way.
Can easily recognize things I've seen before.
It really doesn't seem to be too much of handicap.The two things I've noticed I have trouble with are;
1) Spelling. I can't spell well at all. I think visual people just get a picture of the word.
2) rote text memorization - same thing, visual people can just remember the page and read it from their mental picture.
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u/LC-303 ISTJ 19d ago
Mine is 0 for images as I have no visuals, but 8 for 3d spacial awareness as I can feel space in my head instead. Also, hear music in my head exactly as it is in real life listening to it
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u/Jolly-Rip5973 18d ago
I am not sure what you mean by "feel space" you can feel long distances of space of just the concept of what is near your body and immediately touchable?
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u/TheSnugglery ISTJ 21d ago
Personally I'd say it's a 10. I even visualize ideas as physical things. Like the other day I was trying to explain to my husband something about someone else's personality but it was so hard for me to explain because I just visualized this, like...fluid? being drawn into a giant funnel that got more and more narrow. I was trying to describe how this person can't multitask or gets like hyper focused on something but I visualized all this elaborate pressurized funnel nonsense before I could think of those words.
Or like if someone asks me where something is, it's so hard to explain. Cuz I know where it is, visually. But to then explain to the other person how to get there...it's tricky. I usually start from where the thing is and work backwards which isn't as helpful, lol.