Psychology : $b A study of mental lifeWoodworth, Robert Sessions
Science
Psychology : $b A study of mental life
Woodworth, Robert Sessions
Psychology
For example, we can examine objects by feeling of them with a stick
held in the hand, and thus perceive their roughness or smoothness; but
how do we sense these facts? It seems to us as if we felt them with
the end of the stick, but that is absurd, since there are no sense
organs in the stick. It must be that we perceive the roughness by
means of sensations arising in the hand and arm, but to identify these
sensations is a much harder task than to discover the objective fact
of roughness.
Again, we distinguish the tones of two musical instruments by aid of
their overtones, but elaborate experiments were required to prove
this, since ordinarily we do not distinguish the overtones, and could
simply say that the instruments sounded differently, and let it go at
that.
Once more, consider our ability to perceive time intervals; {439} and
to distinguish an interval of a second from one of a second and a
quarter. How in the world can any one perceive time? Time is no force
that could conceivably act as a stimulus to a sense organ. It must be
some change or process that is the stimulus and that serves as the
indication of duration. Most likely, it is some muscular or internal
bodily change, but none of the more precise suggestions that have been
offered square with all the facts. It cannot be the movements of
breathing that give us our perception of time, for we can hold our
breath and still distinguish one short interval from another. It
cannot be the heart beat, for we can beat time in a rhythm that cuts
across the rate of the heart beat. When a singer is accompanying
himself on the piano, keeping good time in spite of the fact that the
notes are uneven in length, and meanwhile using his feet on the
pedals, what has he got left to beat time with? No one has located the
stimulus to which accurate time perception responds, though, in a
general way, we are pretty sure that change of one sort or another is
the datum. With longer intervals, from a minute to several hours, the
sign of duration is probably the amount happening in the interval, or
else such progressive bodily changes as hunger and fatigue.
The Perception of Space
Stimuli for the perception of location are provided by all the senses.
We perceive a taste as in the mouth, thirst as in the throat, hunger
pangs as in the stomach. To a familiar odor we may respond by knowing
the odorous substance to be close at hand. To stimulation of the
semi-circular canals we respond by knowing the direction in which we
are being turned.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Psychology : $b A study of mental life — John Shaqi
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