It is known that eye movements during object imagery reflect areas visited during encoding. But will eye movements also reflect pictorial low-level features of imagined stimuli? In this paper, three experiments are reported in which we investigate whether low-level properties of mental images elicit specific eye movements. Based on the conceptualization of mental images as depictive representations, we expected low-level visual features to influence eye fixations during mental imagery, in the absence of a visual input. In a first experiment, twenty-five participants performed a visual imagery task with high vs. low spatial frequency and high vs. low contrast gratings. We found that both during visual perception and during mental imagery, first fixations were more often allocated to the low spatial frequency–high contrast grating, thus showing that eye fixations were influenced not only by physical properties of visual stimuli but also by its imagined counterpart. In a second experiment, twenty-two participants imagined high contrast and low contrast stimuli that they had not encoded before. Again, participants allocated more fixations to the high contrast mental images than to the low contrast mental images. In a third experiment, we ruled out task difficulty as confounding variable. Our results reveal that low-level visual features are represented in the mind’s eye and thus, they contribute to the characterization of mental images in terms of how much perceptual information is re-instantiated during mental imagery.

众所周知，对象图像期间的眼球运动反映了编码期间访问的区域。但是眼球运动是否也会反映想象刺激的图像低级特征？在本文中，报告了三个实验，其中我们研究了心理图像的低级属性是否会引起特定的眼球运动。基于心理图像作为描述性表示的概念化，我们预计在没有视觉输入的情况下，低层次的视觉特征会影响心理图像过程中的眼睛注视。在第一个实验中，25 名参与者执行了具有高与低空间频率以及高与低对比度光栅的视觉图像任务。我们发现，无论是在视觉感知过程中还是在心理意象过程中，第一次注视更多地分配给低空间频率 - 高对比度光栅，因此表明眼睛注视不仅受到视觉刺激的物理特性的影响，而且还受到其想象的对应物的影响。在第二个实验中，22 名参与者想象了他们以前没有编码过的高对比度和低对比度刺激。同样，参与者将更多的注视分配给高对比度的心理图像而不是低对比度的心理图像。在第三个实验中，我们排除了任务难度作为混杂变量。我们的研究结果表明，低层次的视觉特征在头脑的眼睛中表现出来，因此，它们有助于在心理意象期间重新实例化多少感知信息来表征心理意象。22 名参与者想象了他们以前没有编码过的高对比度和低对比度刺激。同样，参与者将更多的注视分配给高对比度的心理图像而不是低对比度的心理图像。在第三个实验中，我们排除了任务难度作为混杂变量。我们的研究结果表明，低层次的视觉特征在头脑的眼睛中表现出来，因此，它们有助于在心理意象期间重新实例化多少感知信息来表征心理意象。22 名参与者想象了他们以前没有编码过的高对比度和低对比度刺激。同样，参与者将更多的注视分配给高对比度的心理图像而不是低对比度的心理图像。在第三个实验中，我们排除了任务难度作为混杂变量。我们的研究结果表明，低层次的视觉特征在头脑的眼睛中表现出来，因此，它们有助于在心理意象期间重新实例化多少感知信息来表征心理意象。