How do infants' thoughts compare to the adults express with language? In particular, can infants entertain negative representations, such as not red or here? four experiments, we used pupillometry ask whether representations are possible without an external language. Eleven-month-olds were tested on their ability detect and represent abstract structure of sequences syllables, defined by relatio...

This article investigates the relationship between visual mental representations and spatial mental representations in human visuo-spatial processing. By comparing two common theories of visuo-spatial processing - mental model theory and the theory of mental imagery - we identified two open questions: (1) which representations are modality-specific, and (2) what is the role of the two represent...

Imagery as Internalized Perception. The classic work on imagery has emphasized the similarity of images to percepts and of operations on images to perceptual or physical operations. Elegant experiments have supported this view: smaller imagined features take more time to verify, larger imagined distances take more time to scan, and figures displaced by greater angles take longer to mentally rot...

Many philosophers and psychologists have attempted to elucidate the nature of mental representation by appealing to notions like isomorphism or abstract structural resemblance. The ‘structural representations’ that these theorists champion are said to count as representations by virtue of functioning as internal models of distal systems. In his 2007 book, Representation Reconsidered, William Ra...

Manyphilosophers and psychologists have attempted to elucidate the nature of mental representation by appealing to notions like isomorphism or abstract structural resemblance. The ‘structural representations’ that these theorists champion are said to count as representations by virtue of functioning as internalmodels of distal systems. In his 2007 book, Representation Reconsidered, William Rams...

Keeping social appointments involves keeping track of what day it is. In practice, mismatches between apparent day and actual day are common. For example, a person might think the current day is Wednesday when in fact it is Thursday. Here we show that such mismatches are highly systematic, and can be traced to specific properties of their mental representations. In Study 1, mismatches between a...