I cannot visualize at all

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I believe I have aphantasia. I can not see anything in my mind. I have had very few dreams in my life, and though I know where I am, who I am with, and what they are saying and doing in the dream, I do not see or hear anything; I just know. When I read any fiction, I skip over much of the descriptive text. Strangely, I still enjoy fiction.

Has anyone else with aphantasia noticed it making executive functioning tasks more difficult?

*For example, it is difficult to organize a plan of action when you can not see the steps in your mind or mentally manipulate them. I need to create a physical representation of the steps. I also use my finger in front of my eye as a visual cursor for what I am currently doing in my environment.

*Another example, it is difficult to use motivation of some future reward when you can not imagine it. I need to make the task itself enjoyable. Strict adherence to my own black-and-white rules is important to avoid future punishments that I can not imagine either. I never think, "I should not do x, because y will result"; I just think, "I should not do x".

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31st of July, 2013
Diagnosed: Autism Spectrum Disorder, Auditory-Verbal Processing Speed Disorder, and Visual-Motor Processing Speed Disorder.

Weak Emerging Social Communicator (The Social Thinking-­Social Communication Profile by Michelle Garcia Winner, Pamela Crooke and Stephanie Madrigal)

"I am silently correcting your grammar."

It's not so much aphantasia as it is dysphantasia, if you not root savvy it means Imparied visualization, I think verbally because of it, but also in pictures so it evens out. It also makes me have a even skill set. It's a good combination, I mean they might as well give me my doctorate, in Pschology, right here right now. I mean, Autism, comes in handy in medicine. This spectrum could also reveal more about. One day, I'm going to specialize in autism. Mainly as it is the most common special interest for obvious reasons. My Parents don't approve of the obsession, Though. Maybe I can start writing it, now so I can just say graduate school, No, need. TBH, I could probably teach sociology to myself by the time I go there. It will make it much easier. I'd have to do some research. I mean if we count autism we can all have professions. I might be able to get scholarship money though so. I should do that just incase I'm pretty sure that you can do that. Since joining the military isn't a option.

This is fascinating. Visualising objects/things is something that I do on a consistent basis. I'm surprised that a lack of visualisation is a trait of ASD considering most Austic people are fairly imaginative.

Do you have dreams?

Gwen I can't either. NOT one bit. When my mother was teaching me to parallel park she insisted I just pretend 2 cars were there. I told her to pretend she was the Queen and take me to Buckingham Castle. When she says pretend to see a car all I can think of is the word car... my mind is totally black, 24/7. When I have a nightmare it's words I am afraid of, no images. I always thought it went with the autisim. But your not alone.

Another aphantasiac/aphantasic here. I always thought it was normal till coming across an article mentioning it and that most people can visualise.

http://www.cbc.ca/radio/popup/audio/lis ... =1.3645555


At 18.30 minutes mentions a subgroup with autism.

Some aphantasiacs say they see images in dreams but I don't. It has been linked with face blindness (I scored low on the Cambridge face memory test but think my facial recognition skills are actually ok) and problems with autobiographical memory(mine is very patchy. My brother can remember much more of what should be shared memories ). http://sdamstudy.weebly.com/