I’m pretty convinced there is a spectrum just on my own experience - apart from having an internal monologue (which I think is just the ability to imagine speech) I can also imagine sounds, different accents and music almost to the same level of perception as hearing them, to the point where even though I love music, I don’t usually listen to it most of the time (in the car, while working etc.) unless there’s something I really want to listen to, because I am just imagining stuff in my head. Yet I usually can’t imagine imagery very well. I can do it (I wouldn’t say it’s to the point of aphantasia), but it feels more abstract and illusory than my auditory imaging.
My experience with auditory imagination is definitely different to most people I have talked to about it, and on the other hand many people seem to be able to visualise images far more vividly than I can.
If it were all basically the same, why would one be so massively different to me?
Sounds to me like you are more trained in one style of thought than another. That doesn't seem so strange to me. Personally I'm not very good with accents or music but I also don't have very much background at all with those things. On the other hand I consciously trained my skills in visualization from a young age.
My experience with auditory imagination is definitely different to most people I have talked to about it, and on the other hand many people seem to be able to visualise images far more vividly than I can.
If it were all basically the same, why would one be so massively different to me?