Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1: Containing Sixteen Experimental Investigations from the Harvard Psychological Laboratory.
Science
Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1: Containing Sixteen Experimental Investigations from the Harvard Psychological Laboratory.
Psychology, Experimental
These conditions, however, are for the most part but conditions which
determine the energy, diversity, complexity and definiteness of the
active processes involved in the bestowal of attention upon its
object, and the experiments show that such active processes are as
essential in ideation as in perception. The stability of an image, or
internal sensation, thus depends on the activity of its motor
accompaniments or conditions. And as the presence of an image to the
exclusion of a rival, which but for the effect of these motor
advantages would have as strong a claim as itself to the occupation of
consciousness (cf. Series I., X.), may be treated as a case of
inhibition, the greater the relative persistence of an image or idea
the greater we may say is the 'force' with which it inhibits its
rival. Exclusive possession of the field involves, to the extent to
which such possession is made good, actual exclusion of the rival; and
exclusion is inhibition. Our generalization, accordingly, may take the
following form:--
The inhibitory effect of an idea, apart from volitional or emotional
bias, depends upon the energy, diversity, complexity and definiteness
of the motor conditions of the idea.
* * * * *
CONTROL OF THE MEMORY IMAGE.
BY CHARLES S. MOORE.
Since Gallon's classic investigation in the field of mental imagery
several similar investigations have been pursued in the same
direction, chiefly, however, for the purpose of discovering and
classifying types of imagination.
Little has been done in the line of developing and studying the
problems of the memory image proper, and still less, in fact almost
nothing, is to be found bearing on the control of the visual memory
image. The general fact of this control has been presented, with
greater or less detail, based upon returns from questionaries. Gallon
himself, for example, having referred to instances in which the
control was lacking, goes on to say[1]: "Others have complete mastery
over their mental images. They can call up the figure of a friend and
make it sit on a chair or stand up at will; they can make it turn
round and attitudinize in any way, as by mounting it on a bicycle or
compelling it to perform gymnastic feats on a trapeze. They are able
to build up elaborate structures bit by bit in their mind's eye and
add, substract or alter at will and at leisure."
[1] Gallon, Francis: 'Inquiries into Human Faculty and its
Development,' London, 1883, p. 109.
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