Inducing positive involuntary mental imagery in everyday life: an experimental investigation

Abstract

<p>Positive involuntary mental imagery occurs frequently in daily life but evidence as to its functions and importance is largely indirect. The current study investigated a method to induce positive involuntary imagery in daily life, which would allow direct testing of its impact. An unselected student sample (N = 80) completed a single session of a positive imagery cognitive bias modification (CBM) paradigm, which involved listening to and imagining brief positive imagery scripts. Participants then recorded any involuntary memories of the imagined training scenarios in a three-day diary before returning to the lab for a follow-up assessment. Participants were randomized to imagine the scenarios in either an emotionally involved or emotionally detached manner, providing a test of the role of emotion in the subsequent experience of involuntary memories. Participants reported experiencing involuntary memories of the training scenarios in their daily life, but the number recorded did not differ between the experimental conditions. Exploratory analyses suggested that more vivid imagery and recall testing were associated with a greater number of involuntary memories. The study highlights the potential of the imagery CBM paradigm to further our understanding of the functions and potential importance of positive involuntary mental imagery in daily life.</p>

Inducing Positive Involuntary Mental Imagery in Daily Life Using Personalized Photograph Stimuli

“…Such studies have generally found that generation of positive mental images has a greater impact on emotion than generation of positive verbal thoughts in healthy participants (e.g. Holmes et al, 2009) and mildly anhedonic individuals (Blackwell et al, 2023). However, even if such differences are found between imagery and verbal thoughts that are generated deliberately, it cannot be assumed that they will also be found for images and verbal thoughts that are experienced involuntarily.…”