Date of Graduation

Spring 2025

Degree

Master of Science in Psychology

Department

Psychology

Committee Chair

Wayne Mitchell

Abstract

Many conventional theories hold mental imagery to be fundamental to self-regulation. Recently, a current of research into mental imagery has developed, with the terms anaurelia and aphantasia being coined for the inability to experience, respectively, auditory and visual thought content, yet little is known about the impact that such individual differences have on persons’ lives. The present experiment was performed in order to test the hypotheses that self-regulation and mental imagery positively correlate and that mental imagery mediates the correlation of resting heart-rate variability and self-regulation. Self-regulation was measured via a self-report questionnaire (the Short Self-Regulation Questionnaire), as was mental imagery (the Plymouth Sensory Imagery Questionnaire). Only the visual and auditory subscales of the Plymouth Sensory Imagery Questionnaire were used, because these two sensory modalities have been found to predominate everyday mental imagery. Resting heart-rate variability was calculated as the root mean square of successive differences between normal heartbeats within the final 30 seconds of a five-minute period of rest. The present results do not support either hypothesis. It is possible that both hypotheses, whether supported by theorization or experimentation, are false. On the other hand, it is possible that the validity of the present method is poor for the testing of the present hypotheses.

Keywords

mental imagery, self-regulation, heart-rate variability, HRV, Self-Regulation Questionnaire, Plymouth Sensory Imagery Questionnaire, SRQ, Psi-Q

Subject Categories

Behavior and Behavior Mechanisms | Cognition and Perception | Psychiatry and Psychology | Psychological Phenomena and Processes

Copyright

© Matthew Daniel Carroll

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