What mental images remain after 23 years of blindness?

Abstract

In this study, we ask whether a subject rates some sensory images change with time. We tested an adult female, aged 43 years, who became blind at 20 years of age. Her imagery had been previously measured on two occasions, at age 23, after 3 years of blindness, and at age 34, after 14 years of blindness. Several tests were now conducted to measure her imagery vividness, imagery control, and mental images linked to several other senses. She was found to score lower than the confidence interval obtained in the reference groups of sighted subjects on mental images that are linked to a sense involving vision, such as visual images. Conversely, the participant scored much higher than the confidence interval obtained in a reference group on mental images, such as auditory, cutaneous, gustatory, olfactory, and organic imagery. Scores on imagery tests may lower with blindness duration, and ratings of images related to other senses may increase.