Visual thinking – or picture thinking – is the ability to tap into the brain’s powerful visual processing center and see words as a series of pictures. Even if you’re not artistically inclined, visual thinking makes it easier to organize your thoughts, form new ideas, and remember essential details.
By engaging in visual thinking, you can transcend the limitations of linear, text-based thought processes and unlock a whole new realm of creative potential. When words transform into vivid mental images, concepts become more tangible, and connections between ideas become clearer.
Moreover, visual thinking fosters innovative problem-solving approaches, as it encourages the exploration of multiple perspectives and the discovery of connections that may otherwise be overlooked.
Curious to find out more about how visual thinking works? Then let’s dive into this fascinating topic!
What is visual thinking?
Even though our brains are predisposed to think visually, it was assumed until the late 1980s that all thought was language-based. Since then, studies in behavior and imaging have confirmed that visual thinking is not only real, it’s relatively wide-spread.
Given its abstract nature, finding a definitive visual thinking definition that makes sense to everyone can prove challenging.
However, a good place to start is by recognizing that visual thinking brains have a knack for:
- Organizing ideas graphically.
- Remembering and recalling information as images.
- Estimating number-based, physical attributes.
For example, you may know people who read books or listen to music purely in order to visualize, who are capable of memorizing instructions by visualizing notes on a page, or who always seem to know at a glance whether that new desk is going to fit through their office door!
To accomplish this, people who think visually rely on two distinct groups of skills:
- Object visualization: The ability to picture scenes in rich detail and process them holistically.
- Spatial visualization: The ability to judge distances, dimensions, and velocities.
Though these don’t necessarily function equally or in tandem for everyone, it’s been suggested that visual thinkers incorporate various aspects of object and spatial visualization to analyze details and take action.
Visual thinking brings clarity to information
No matter what kind of thinking you tend to do, your brain is wired to quickly understand and remember visual input. So, whether you’re on the giving or receiving end of things, applying visual thinking to everyday events and relationships can bring greater clarity to information.
Visual thinking tools and techniques help you:
- See or show how data and other information connects so it can be grouped and sorted more efficiently.
- Explain or understand complicated concepts better so relationships between ideas can be established and explored.
- Teach or learn new procedures or information by associating it with images that can be remembered and applied more effectively.
Using tools like infographics, concept maps, timelines, charts, drawings, and other “pictures” to produce well-designed visual images is a much more powerful way to share experiences and knowledge than verbal or textual information alone.
When it comes to education, for example, visual learning techniques have been shown to improve everything from reading comprehension and writing skills, to long-term retention and test scores.
Meanwhile, in the workplace, business visualization experts like Dan Roam (author of the bestseller “The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures”) believe visual clarity is something everyone can learn to express if they have the right tools and techniques.
Do you need to write a story, instruct a class, or plan a work project? Whether you’re alone or part of a team, you’ll find it significantly easier to introduce, share, and make sense of new knowledge when that information is represented visually.
How visual thinking differs from other types of thinking
Allowing for many shades of grey in between, there are essentially two types of thinkers: visual and verbal. To get a better idea of what their thought processes look like, here’s a simplified view of visual thinking vs verbal thinking.
Visual thinkers:
- Think about information by seeing pictures in their head (somewhat like watching a movie).
- Experience abstract thoughts that sometimes need to be verbalized before they can be fully formed.
- Often require time to respond to a question or find the right word or phrase to express what they’re thinking.
Verbal thinkers:
- Think about information in words (somewhat like talking to themselves).
- Experience an internal narrative or monologue that plays out in sentences they hear in their head.
- Often need to shut down multiple verbal threads before they can direct their full attention to new information.
Not only do visual and verbal thinking skills coexist in everyone’s mind, some of the best creative thinking is achieved when the two interact.
So, if you want to bring out the best in your team from a business perspective, start by acknowledging that there are different types of thinkers in every workplace – then employ proven visualization tools and techniques to make it easier to address and engage every one of them.
Putting visual thinking to work
The key to benefiting from visual thinking lies in recognizing that it’s an active process – not a passive one.
Rather than just watching images float by, thinking visually involves working to:
- Brainstorm abstract ideas by laying them out graphically.
- Consciously create a new picture to help connect others.
- Manipulate imagery to better organize and reflect the information it’s meant to project.
Integrating visual thinking tools as a business professional can enhance your presentations, foster more insightful discussions, and improve team performance.
So, whether your aim is to grasp an idea better yourself – or share important knowledge with others – remember that the best thinking emerges when you use pictures to join information from different people and different contexts together.
MindManager® is a powerful mind mapping tool that can be used to help you get better at visual thinking. Get started with a free trial today!
