This is my question. I have been looking all over and I can't find the answer and I remember seeing something (maybe on this forum) about this maybe 6-12 months ago. In any case, for example say I get retention one time from watching the ESPN Bottomline.........Am I more likely to get retention while watching the ESPN Bottomline? Am I more likely to get retention in the Area where the ESPN Bottomline caused the retention? Or Neither? This goes for a multitude of other static images (Logos, Video-Game HUDs), I just used the ESPN Bottomline because everyone is familiar with it. Please I know there are a lot of knowledgable people in here and if someone could shed some light on this it would be great :)

I have never seen any information about the likelihood of recurrence in the last couple of years of following plasma TV technology closely. But given what's known about the mechanism of image retention, the probably answer is No, it's not more likely to recur in the same place.

Reason: Based on what I've read, visible image retention is due to a consistent differential charge state in the dielectric layer of the plasma cells in one area compared to the rest of the screen. It fades when the charge state in that area has been sufficiently randomized to match the average state of the rest of the screen. That means that the underlying effect is going on all the time in all the plasma cells across the entire screen. The only reason why you see it is because all the plasma cells in one contiguous area of the screen have been left in a similar state, allowing your eye to pick up the difference in pattern from the rest of the screen. It's probably within the normal range of variation that's occuring all the time in individual cells, but as long as it's randomized at the individual cell level across the screen, you don't see any visible pattern. Keep in mind that the actual difference in luminance of the affected cell is very small - it's only the very high sensitivity of your eye to patterns that allows you to notice the image retention effect at all.

This is different from "burn in", the effect of differential aging of the phosphors, which takes longer and is more permanent.