After-Images from Retina and Brain

Abstract

The evidence pointing to the retinal origin of after-images is considered. The reports of the occurrence of after-images from visual images of hallucinatory vividness are reviewed.

Experimental results are presented to indicate that a complementarily coloured afterimage may arise following the exposure of the temporarily blind retina to a coloured stimulus.

After-images, or after-effects, from vivid images are described in seventeen persons (mostly possessors of “number-forms”). They are found to move with the eyes and to show, in some persons, a degree of conformity with Emmert's Law which, while considerable, is less than that of after-images of real stimuli. In the case of one “eidetic” subject, the after-images from neither real nor imaged stimuli conformed with Emmert's Law. In some persons, after-images of images occur in complementary colours.

The retinal origin of after-images is affirmed, but that they can occur occasionally as a purely central phenomenon is acknowledged. The possible learned or inherent nature of after-images of central origin is discussed.