This may not be the appropriate forum, but..

 

When someone's thinking, you often see their eyes darting around, but not really registering the external environment. Has anyone ever discovered a correlation between the directions the eyes look and what's being seen internally?

 

As a gross example, if someone were remembering a horse race, might her eyes track from left to right (or vice versa) matching the visual memory being experienced?

It has to do with accessing different parts of the brain. You'll also find studies related to people lying who looking up and to the left when they are accessing the "creative" side of their brains.

The darting eye motion is called a saccade, and relates to how your brain builds up a visual image of your surroundings. Microsaccades (small jerks at 30-70 Hz) are necessary for basic vision, as the photoreceptors in the eye (rods and cones) react to changes in light, rather than constant illumination.

While natural saccadic movements are fascinating, GDG, I'm not entirely sure that's what's being asked about here in this thread. My sense of THX's post is that he is wondering why we look in certain directions when thinking about specific things.

 

TXH - Maybe you can clarify?

My sense of THX's post is that he is wondering why we look in certain directions when thinking about specific things.

 

Not exactly -- I was wondering if our eyes move in response to a replayed memory as they did when the memory was recorded. Or is imagined.

 

If I watch something with my focus of interest moving left to right (as my example of a horse race), as I'm replaying it on the inside of my forehead would my eyes possibly track left to right as they did when I watched the original event?

 

Dunno if that's any clearer, but it sounds as though the answer is 'almost certainly not.'

 

I think I ended up here from pondering a segment in What the Bleep Do We Know? which suggested that the cognitive centres can't actually tell whether their input is from external sources or from memory. (Or something like that. I can replay the vid and get the exact remark if desired.)

Yes, the eye movements are related to recall: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/119715257/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0

 

I seem to remember some scientists being able to tell what someone was thinking (though requiring previous data on that thought and it's patterns) by either their brainwaves or eye movements, don't remember which.

Not exactly -- I was wondering if our eyes move in response to a replayed memory as they did when the memory was recorded. Or is imagined.

 

If I watch something with my focus of interest moving left to right (as my example of a horse race), as I'm replaying it on the inside of my forehead would my eyes possibly track left to right as they did when I watched the original event?

 

No, the brain is not like a VCR, and we don't "replay" memories in the sense that you suggest. Your eyes would not move left to right during recall if you were (for example) remembering a football game where the player was going left to right.

 

The placement of the eyes is contingent upon which area of the brain is being accessed to pull the memory. Memory is interconnected with many brain areas, and we simply "look" toward the area of the brain which is being most activated when retrieving that memory.