Image a phone and browse on computer emulator? I have a galaxy nexus (stock OS). During its use I have used WeChat and WhatsApp, and would like to save my chat and voice histories within these programs.

Does a way exist to image my current phone as it is, so I can load it onto some PC emulator and browse these apps on my PC? This would allow me to save everything as it is, but also start fresh on my phone with a format. I do not want to format my phone then load back on WeChat for instance, yet I still want to be able to browse my old WeChat chats and voice clips (using a PC).

Thanks
You can make an adb backup of only the desired apps, then adb restore it to an emulator. As far as I know, this should preserve all the apps' data. Also, backups of user apps should be compatible between different versions and architectures of Android - but there's a chance of failure, so try it before you wipe anything!