Semantic representation of synaesthesia

Abstract

Synaesthesia has multifaceted consequences for both subjective experience and cognitive performance. Here, I broach the issue of how synaesthesia is represented in semantic memory. I hypothesize that, for example, in grapheme colour synaesthesia, colour is represented as an additional feature in the semantic network that enables the formation of associations that are not present in nonsynaesthetes. Thus, synaesthesia provokes richer memory representations which enable learning opportunities that are not present in non-synaesthetes, provides additional memory cues, and may trigger creative ideas.