What aphantasia can teach us about episodic memory

A recent proposal is to characterise aphantasia as an episodic memory condition. Aphantasics show difficulties in recalling details of situations from their distant and recent past. They are less confident about their episodic memories and also seem to be less emotionally affected by them. But can we really say that aphantasics have a poor episodic memory? The aim of this contribution is to analyse in depth four strands of research (i.e., pictorial memory tests, memory accuracy, hippocampal activity, and SDAM) that challenge this idea and emphasise the necessity for a more in-depth understanding of episodic memory in aphantasics. Moreover, these studies prompt a reflection on the very definition of episodic memory and its relationship to both mental imagery and imagination, which may be weaker than previously thought, to the extent that aphantasia is primarily understood as a mental imagery condition and that aphantasics have troubles with imaginative projection into both future specific scenarios and atemporal situations.