Loren N. Bouyer¹, Dietrich S. Schwarzkopf², Blake W. Saurels¹, Derek H. Arnold¹; ¹The University of Queensland, ²School of Optometry & Vision Science, The University of Auckland, New Zealand

There are marked individual differences in peoples' capacity to construct imagined visual experiences within their mind. This capacity ranges from aphants who report an inability to construct mental images at all to hyper-phantasics who report having imagined experiences that are as realistic as seeing. The vividness of imagined images is most often measured via subjective self-report. However, Chang and Pearson (2018) have suggested that probe detection in a binocular rivalry (BR) protocol can be used as an objective measure. They found that pre-imagining a moving input could enhance performance on an objective probe detection task when probes were embedded in imagery-consistent inputs, as opposed to imagery-inconsistent inputs. To date, nobody has assessed if this type of objective imagery priming can be used to predict the vividness of different people’s visualisations. Here, we report that imagery priming of objective sensitivity to probes within static BR inputs does not correlate with the typical ratings people use to describe the vividness of their visualisations (a between participants effect). However, objective priming of sensitivity to probes embedded in BR inputs was greater on trials when participants reported that their pre-imagined experience had been relatively vivid (a within participants effect). Overall, our data suggest that while imagery can prime objective sensitivity to probes during BR, there is currently no strong evidence that this effect can be used as an objective method of predicting the subjective vividness of different people’s visualisations.