Thinking in pictures

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My thinking patterns are very similar to many others that have posted in this thread. When I'm thinking words type themselves in bold black letters in empty space. My mind will then usually put scenes together to illustrate the sequence of thoughts. When someone else is speaking to me, I will almost always think of what they're saying in scenes. The same with reading a book. I thought everyone did this. When I was really young, and just learned how to read I used to silently spell out every word that was spoken to me inside of my head. I don't think that counts as thinking in words, though, because I wasn't attaching any meaning to what they were actually saying. I was just having fun with spelling in my own little world.

However, I'm very, very bad at spatial concepts. If someone is trying to explain to me that they are going to remodel their kitchen I cannot imagine what things would look like if walls, and such were moved. It is literally impossible for me to imagine things in that way. I don't understand how I can think mostly in pictures, but unable to imagine something so simple.

This thread is fascinating especially when you consider PECS. Once upon a time, my child used PECS. PECS are tools used to teach more severe Autistics to communicate and even read. PECS are picture tools and used in every Early Intervention program by teachers, ABA Specialists, Occupational and Speech Therapists. Sometimes even the most profound Autistics can't communicate until PECS are put into use. A written or spoken word may be meaningless, but a picture allows them to express themselves and communicate. Why? Maybe it's because of the Thinking In Pictures thing. I'm just hypothesizing. But, pictures do allow some to open up to others and be able to relate. Maybe many, but not every, Autistic thinks in this way. So, when they're presented with pictures, instead of words, it's a language they can use.

http://www.pecs.com/WhatsPECS.htm

My child is very visual. He may think in pictures, too. We don't know yet. He does have a photographic memory.

I think in both pictures and words, but even the words are in a "picture form," since I "see" words spelled out whenever I think or hear somebody else speak. When I think, I both mentally hear and see the words at the same time, as if I were reading them out of a book. Images just naturally come to me, and I never realized that I "think in pictures" until recently, when I figured out that few people think the way I do. I'm the type of person who will have a "movie" in their head whenever somebody is telling a story to me, or when I'm relaying a story to somebody else. It's actually very fun and is a way to keep away boredom. If I'm bored, I just re-live a scene from a movie or TV show that I like, and it's like I'm really watching it.
-OddDuckNash99-

Mostly I think in sounds, in fact, there's like a distinctive voice that I "hear" my thoughts in (no, not like auditory hallucinations or "hearing voices" or anything like that), but sometimes I think in pictures and like "printed" words and numbers. It depends what I'm thinking about.