A Primer of Psychology

Class __ Book- Copightl^i" COFimiGHT DEPOSIT.

in 2011 with funding from The Library of Congress A PRIMER OF PSYCHOLOGY BY EDWARD BRADFORD TITCHENER THE MACMILLAN COMPANY LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., Ltd.

.3 All rights reserved :d Copyright, 1898, By the MACMILLAN COMPANY.

Norwood Mass. U.S.A.

PREFACE This volume is intended as a first book in psychol- ogy. My endeavour in writing it has been to satisfy the two main requirements of a scientific primer: to outline, with as little of technical detail as is com- patible with accuracy of statement, the methods and results of modern psychology, and to stimulate the reader, by means of questions and exercises upon the subject-matter of the separate chapters and of refer- ences to more advanced treatises, to further study in the same field.

The Primer stands in the closest relation to my previously published OtUline of Psychology. It has, indeed, been written in response to requests, urged from many quarters by correspondents who approved the teaching of the earlier work, that I should pre- pare for use in high schools and normal schools a text-book conceived from the same general stand- point. Nevertheless, the two are distinct books. The exposition of the Primer is simpler, and its range wider. I have here followed current usage in treating of Perception and Idea as different processes, and in restricting the application of the phrase ' asso- ciation of ideas '; while I have added chapters on Abnormal Psychology and on the Province and the Relations of Psychology. I have throughout laid greater emphasis upon the fact of mental evolution; vi Preface and have availed myself of the progress of the sci- ence to improve certain of the Sections that deal with Sensation and Perception. I have, further, made free use of literary illustrations. On points of systematic psychology — in method and order of pre- sentment, in advocacy of the experimental control of introspection, in ascription of the highest value to analysis — the Primer and the Outline are, naturally, in entire agreement.

The writing of an Elementary Psychology is, in the present state of our knowledge, no easy matter. One must needs be systematic; a volume of detached * lessons in psychology ' would be of little value: yet it is difficult to be systematic and to be simple at one and the same time. Again, one may introduce one's readers to psychology either by the way of a general account of scientific method or by the way of brain anatomy and brain physiology. After careful con- sideration, I have myself taken the former course; but the alternative has much to commend it. Again, there are many authoritative names which do not appear in my list of references. It was necessary to make a choice; but my choice may not have been the wisest that could be made. I shall be grateful for all concrete criticism on these and other matters, whether the sins rebuked be sins of omission or of commission, and shall do my best to profit by it, — as, in spite of all deficiencies, I have done my present best in writing the book.

At the end of the volume will be found a list of the apparatus required for the experiments described in the various chapters. No experiment should be undertaken whose meaning the teacher does not thoroughly understand; none should be performed in Preface vii class until he has thoroughly tested and familiarised himself with the instruments. So far as time allows, pupils should be encouraged to put their own appa- ratus together: to cut their own colour-discs, calculate their own pendulum-units, etc. They should also be instructed that the object of a psychological experi- ment is not to ^get things right,' to arrive at some prescribed result; but to get things as they are, to arrive at the truth. All idea of competition should be eliminated from the work. It will probably be found that Chapters VI., IX., and XIII. are some- what more difficult than the rest; more time should therefore be allotted to their study. Sections "jQ and io8 should be omitted if reaction-experiments cannot be carried out, and carried out in some detail. Sec- tions 121 and 122, and the greater part of § 123, should be omitted from a high-school course. For the benefit of teachers who may desire to extend the brief account of the brain and nervous system given in § 6, I have included brain models in the list of apparatus. It would be well to consult the Index (under Physiology) before determining the form which this extension shall assume. Throughout the book I have referred, where reference seemed useful, to Pro- fessor Huxley's Elementary Lessons in PJiysiology (reprint of 1897: The Macmillan Co.) and to Pro- fessor Nichols' The Ontlines of Physics {i?>()y \ The Macmillan Co.). These works are cited as H. and A^. respectively. A few citations of F. refer the reader to Professor Foster's Text-book of Physiology (single vol. ed., 1897: The Macmillan Co.). An- swers to the ' Questions ' appended to the chapters can always be worked out, if not from the text, from the ^ References ' that follow.

viii Preface Since psychology is intimately connected, both by tradition and in fact, with the disciplines comprised under the term ' philosophy,' it may be advisable to say a word here upon a subject which I have not dis- cussed in the body of the book, — - the relation of psychology to ontology and epistemology. It is often asserted, on the one hand, that modern psychology leads to a materialistic metaphysics, and, on the other, that it proceeds in flagrant disregard of modern theory of knowledge. I cannot admit that either charge is well founded. I believe that materialism — the on- tology of Kraft und Stoff and of the '' Belfast Ad- dress " — is wholly unpalatable to scientific thinkers of the present day; and that the chief danger which besets the psychologist, in particular, is that of fall- ing not into a crass materialism but into an equally crude spiritualism. I believe, further, though I have Professor Ward's strictures well in mind, that psy- chology, like every science, has a full right to its own methodological assumptions, no matter whether they agree or disagree with the conclusions of epistemol- ogy, — provided always that the disagreement be recognised as temporary and that the assumptions be not proclaimed as facts beyond the limits of the special science. Thus the difference between § 2 of the Outline and § 5 of the Prhner is due, not to any change of standpoint, but to the conviction that the hypothesis which ^ works ' best in a given context is, so far as that context is concerned, the right hypothe- sis to employ.

It is a very pleasant duty to acknowledge the assistance that I have received in the preparation of the book. I have, in the first place, to thank my wife for a revision of manuscript and proof, and for Preface ix drawing the nineteen figures (a few of which are adapted from other works) inserted in the text. Miss M. E. Schallenberger and Miss E. B. Talbot, mem- bers of my Graduate Seminary, have kindly read the book through in manuscript, and have made many valuable suggestions. Professor E. C. Sanford, of Clark University, has most generously allowed me to publish an account of his new reaction-timer before he has himself described the instrument in print. Professor L. Witmer, of the University of Pennsyl- vania, Dr. W. B. Pillsbury, of the University of Michigan, and Professor J. Seth and Mr. I. M. Bent- ley, my colleagues in the Sage School of Philosophy, have given their help upon numerous special points. To all I desire to express my sincere thanks.

Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., Christmas, 1897.

CONTENTS CHAPTER I Psychology: What it Is and What it Does PAGE § 8. The Divisions of Mind...19 § 9. The Problem of Psychology...22 Additional Questions and Exercises...22 References for Further Reading...23 CHAPTER II The Method of Psychology 24 Experiment..., . Psychological Observation The Psychological Experiment.

29 The Method of Psychology General Rules for Introspection Questions and Exercises. References...XI xu Contents CHAPTER III Sensation § i6. Sensations and their Classification §17. Sensations from the Eye.

§18. Sensations from the Ear.

§19. Sensations from the Skin.

§ 20. Sensations from the Mouth and Nose §21. Sensations from Internal Organs § 22. Intensity of Sensations Questions and Exercises.

References CHAPTER IV Affection and Feeling § 24. The Two Kinds of Affection § 26. The Bodily Signs of Affection.

§ 27. Affection and Sensation...§ 28. Are there More than Two Kinds of Affection?

Questions and Exercises...References...CHAPTER V Attention The Problem of Attention Attention as a State of Consciousness The Three Forms of Attention. Bodily Tendency and Mental Constitution Attention and Affection. The Bodily Attitude in Attention Apperception...The Working of Attention The Physiological Conditions of Attention Questions and Exercises. References...PAGE 38 42 45 46 47 49 50 51 56 57 59 62 64 68 71 7^ 73 74 76 78 81 84 85 ^% 90 91 93 Contents Xlll CHAPTER VI Perception The Formation of Perceptions and Ideas.

The Difference between Perception and Idea The Three Classes of Perceptions The Development of Perception Perceptions of Quality: Taste, Resistance, Musical Note Perceptions of Space: Place or Locality upon the Skin Perceptions of Space: Position Perceptions of Space: Bodily Posture Perceptions of Space: Movement Perceptions of Time: Rhythm What Perception Means.

Illusions of Perception Questions and Exercises.

PAGE . lOI . no CHAPTER VII Idea and the Association of Ideas The Development of Ideas The Four Chief Memory-types.

The Three Verbal Sub-types The Minor Memory-types The Association of Ideas...Simultaneous Association...Successive Association...The Physiological Conditions of Association Questions and Exercises...References...CHAPTER VIII Emotion § 58. Feeling, Emotion and Mood...141 § 59. How Emotions are Formed...143 ^ 60. The Bodily Expression of Emotion: Trunk and Limbs. 144 XIV Contents PAGE The Bodily Expression of Emotion: Face...146 The Classification of the Emotions.

Qualitative Emotions...Temporal Emotions...Mixed Feelings Questions and Exercises References, • » CHAPTER IX The Simpler Forms of Action Movement and Action...

The Conscious Condition of Primitive Action. Impulse: The Idea of Own Movement Impulse: The Idea of Result. Ideomotor Action...Reflex Movement...Instinctive Action...The Physiology and the Psychology of Movement The Classification of Impulses and Instincts The Simple Reaction Questions and Exercises,...References ^n CHAPTER X Memory and Imagination The Two Kinds of Memory and Imagination Recognition and Memory: Passive. The Mark of Familiarity...The Degrees of Recognition and of Memory Recognition and Memory: Active. The Physiology of Memory and Forgetfulness The ' Three Stages ' in Remembering Direct Apprehension...Contents XV § 85. What Imagination Means § 86. Passive Imagination § 87. Active Imagination.

Questions and Exercises.

CHAPTER XI Thought and Self-consciousness Language Thought Judgment and Reasoning. ' Aggregate Ideas and Concepts Comparison, Relation and Abstraction The Concept of Self...Self-consciousness...Questions and Exercises References CHAPTER XII Sentiment The Forms of Sentiment The Intellectual Sentiments.

The Social and the Religious Sentiments The ^Esthetic Sentiments The Practical Utility of y^Lsthetics.

Questions and Exercises...References..., CHAPTER XIII The Complex Forms of Action § loi. The Development of Action beyond the Impulse § 103. Volitional Action...§ 104. Choice and Resolve PAGE XVI Contents § 105. The Freedom of the Will § 106. Ideomotor Action and Automatic Movement § 107. The Classification of Action § 108. The Compound Reaction Questions and Exercises...^ CHAPTER XIV ■ Abnormal Psychology.

§ no. The Origin and Composition of Dreams. §111. The Characteristics of the Dream Consciousness §112. Hypnotism.. -...§113. The Conditions. of Hypnosis...

§ 114. Some Debated Questions of Hypnosis §115. Insanity and its Conditions...§116. The Chief Forms of Insanity...Questions and Exercises...References...PAGE CHAPTER XV The Province and the Relations of Psychology The Scope of Psychology...286 Child Psychology.. " 288 Animal Psychology...290 Ethnic Psychology...292 The Relation of Psychology to Ethics and Logic.. 295 The Relation of Psychology to Pedagogy...298 Conclusion...300 Questions and Exercises...303 References...304 Appendix: Apparatus and Materials Index of Names and Subjects A PRIMER OF PSYCHOLOGY CHAPTER I Psychology: What it Is and What it Does w § I. The Meaning of ^Psychology.' — The word 'psy- Psychology chology comes irom the two Greek words psyche^ of mind *mind,' and logos, *word.' Psychology therefore means, by derivation, * words' or 'talk about mind.' But it is understood among scientific men that when the word logos forms the last ^part of a compound English word it shall mean not simply * talk about' „^,..,, a subject, but the science of that subject. Hence we sometimes speak of the sciences as the 'ologies.' Biology, for instance, which is derived from the Greek bios, 'life,' and logos, means the science of life; and oology, which comes from oon, *egg,' and logos, is the science of birds' eggs. It would not be quite true to say, then, that psychology means ' talk about mind *; it rather means ' science of mind ' or ' mental science.'

§ 2. Science. — But what is the difference between Science is ' talk about ' a thing and the ' science ' of the thing } and me-^ The sciences can all be put into words; they are ^^odicai knowledge.

written down in books, and courses of lectures are given upon them. After all, therefore, science is talk. Is there any real difference between them } B I -♦ 2 Psychology: What it Is and What it Does The answer might be put in this way: all science » is talk, but not all talk is science. Science is a particular kind of writing or talking. Talk may be random, scrappy, sketchy; we may talk about a thing when we do not know much about it, so that our talk deals only with one side of it or is patched out with guesswork; or we may talk only for a little time together, so that we do not at all exhaust the subject. Science, on the other hand, is orderly and methodical talk, talk that gives a complete and exhaustive ac- count of the subject, talk in which no details are left out which can help us to explain the things talked about. Hence to say that psychology is the science of mind is very different from saying that it is simply talk about mind. We all talk about mind: we ' make up our mind,' or we ^have half a mind' to do some- thing: but we are not all psychologists. The science of mind must give a complete account and an orderly, well-arranged account of its subject, keeping the facts steadily in view and never running off into mere speculation.

The science Let US look for a moment at the two sciences mentioned of biology. j^g|. j^Q^. biology and oology. Biology is one of the largest and widest, oology one of the smallest of the sciences: but in calling each of them a science we mean precisely the same thing. Biology is an orderly and methodical account of life. It has to ask and answer definite questions.: how life is distributed over the earth, what animals and plants are found in what places, and why; how life came to be so different in its forms as it now is, how species of plants and animals arose; how it is that our own life shows certain characteristics and peculiarities which we have inherited from our parents, as they did from their parents; etc. All these questions are approached carefully and worked upon by accurate methods; and the answers are all brought together and compared with each other. If they disagree, the questions are tried again: until at last the answers har- monise. When this is the case, when we have a complete account of life (complete, that is, so far as the facts are known) with no contradictions between one part of it and another, we have a ' system ' of knowledge about life, or a * science of biology.'

So it is with oology. Every schoolboy can say something The science about birds' eggs. But the science of oology deals with them ^ °° °^^' in an orderly and methodical way. It tries to find out the meaning of all the different colours and markings; it com- pares the shapes and sizes of eggs; it asks whether the colour of the place where the eggs are laid has anything to do with their colour, and whether the nature of the nest or rock or soil has anything to do with their shape. The oolo- gist knows at once, when he sees the eggs of the Enghsh robin and the American robin, that the birds must be quite different: the one is the tgg of a Sylviine bird, the other that of a thrush {Turdus). His knowledge is arranged, systematic; not haphazard and scrappy. It is ^ scientific' It should be said, perhaps, that science, as we have defined it, is rather the ideal of knowledge than its actual state As a mat- ter of fact, none of the ' sciences ' is a complete and perfectly har- '^ monious system; new facts are constantly being discovered, and new explanations adopted. But the ideal which is aimed at, and which is slowly being realised, is that of the complete system. We may, therefore, rightly give the name of science to any body of knowledge which has been gained by scientific methods and is approximating to the scientific ideal.

That psychology really is a science, as it professes to be. The science is something that we must take for granted here. We con- o^psychol- not prove it until we have found out what psychology has to say about mind. Then, at the end of our enquiry, we shall be able to look back over what has been said, and see that psychology, so far as it has gone, makes up an orderly and 4 Psychology: What it Is and What it Does What is mind?

The popular notion of mind.

systematic body of knowledge. We shall not, indeed, find that it is a finished science: there are yet many problems for the psychologist to solve. But we shall see that it is a science, in the sense in which biology and oology are sciences.

§ 3. Mind. — The subject that psychology treats of is mind. Plainly, then, it is the psychologist who can best answer the question what mind is. We, who are now beginning to study psychology, cannot be expected to know what mind is; we shall not know it till later on, when we have worked over the field of the science. Still, it would be unwise to begin to read without having any idea of what we are going to read about. It will be worth while, therefore, to try to find out in a general way what mind is, even if we cannot at present give a complete answer to the question. And we can find out most easily, per- haps, if we ask, first, what people say who are not psychologists, and then compare their answer with what the psychologist himself says.

If we ask someone who is not a psychologist, — someone, that is, who has not made a scientific study of mind, — what mind is, he will probably say this: ^' Mind is something inside of you which thinks and imagines and remembers. A stone does not know whether it is in one place or another; that is because it has no mind. A young oak sapling does not feel sorry when we cut down the parent oak: but we feel sorry when our parents die, because our minds can understand what death means. I have never been to Africa; but I can imagine what an African forest looks like, because my mind has imagination. Just as your body eats and drinks and walks and sleeps, so your mind thinks and feels and imagines and remembers. All these things that go on inside of you are done by your mind; they are the way in which your mind works." And then, if we press him further, and ask again what the mind really is that works in these ways, he will say: ** We do not know much about that. We can only say that mind is not made up of matter, as the body is; it is immaterial. It lives inside the body, but does not take up any space: just as a room is full of air, but you can walk through it without knowing that it is not empty. Very possibly it has the same shape as the body, like a sort of ghost. But we do not know much about it; we only know its workings."

Now there is a part of this answer that the psy- chologist will be quite ready to accept; but there is a part of it which he will say is wrong. That is not surprising; we should not expect a man who had not made a scientific study of a subject to be able to give a description of it that would satisfy others who had done so. Let us see, then, what is right in the answer and what is wrong.

It is true that thoughts and memories and imagi- Really, mind nations and feelings are parts of mind. It is true, thoughts and too, in a sense, that they *go on inside of us. But f^eimgs; the psychologist does not think it true that they are * done by ' the mind or are the * workings ' of the mind, — that the mind is something separate from them. He believes that they are the mind; that the mind is just the sum of them all: so that when he says ' mind ' he is simply using a sort of short- hand phrase for 'all my thoughts and feelings.'

6 Psychology: What it Is and What it Does as the chair It is a little difficult at first to understand this use of the w, not las, ^ord ^mind'; but it is important that the use should be seat and ^ ^ back, etc. understood. To make it clearer we will take an illustration. Suppose we were asked to describe a chair. We might say: " A chair is a piece of furniture that has a seat, and four legs, and bars, and a back, and sometimes arms and rockers. '^ That seems true enough. But if we look at the description closely we find a difficulty. Does the chair ^ have ' these parts? Is there any chair there if you take the legs and back and seat and arms away? It is more nearly true to say that the chair is all these things than that it has them. When we speak of the ^legs of a chair,' we do not mean that the chair is complete without its legs; we ought really to say * the legs of the rest of a chair ' or ' the legs of back and seat and arms.' Now it is precisely the same with mind. We must not say that the mind ^has' thoughts and feelings; but that the mind is thoughts and feelings. Take away the thoughts and feelings and you take away the mind.

^' But we are constantly losing thoughts; we forget things. Yet the mind remains." So may the chair-seat lose straws or bits of cloth or parts of its hair-padding; yet the chair remains. And the mind is renewed as the chair is; we learn new things, to make up for what we have forgotten. Take away a great group of thoughts, and the mind is an ' insane ' mind, a fragment that is of little use, — like the chair without its legs. Take away thoughts and feelings altogether, and you take away the whole mind.

§ 4. Thing and Process. — Mind, then, is the sum of thoughts, feelings, etc. They are the material, the stuff, so to speak, of which mind is made; and they are accordingly the matters with which psychology deals. Things and The objects of which science treats are of two dif- processes. ferent kinds. They may be things, or they may be processes. If we were arranging fossil specimens or § 4- Tiling and Process. 7 shells or minerals, or if we were experimenting in the physical laboratory with the wedge and the inclined plane and falling bodies, we should be handling things. Things are, for all practical purposes, last- ing and unchanging; they a7^e there, on the table before us, and they do not alter as we look at them. On the other hand, if we were watching the course of a chemical change as it occurred in the test-tube, or observing the growth of a tadpole into a frog, we should be dealing with processes. Processes are always changing; they are different now from what they were a moment ago and from what they will be a moment later; they go on there, in the test-tube or the aquarium before us. — Psychology is a science that treats exclusively of matters of the second sort, i.e.^ of processes. In psychology we observe events, occurrences, happenings, goings on, processes: never things. There is no part of mind, no thought or feeling or memory or imagination, that we can catch at rest and watch unchanged; thought and feeling are changing, moving, shifting from instant to instant. Mind, then, as the sum of thoughts and feelings and Mind is a the rest, is a sum of processes. The objects of the processes. ' science of mind ' are the processes of mind; the objects of 'mental science' are mental processes.

To be able to convince oneself of the fact that the objects of psychology are always processes, one must have had some amount of training and practice in psychological observation. But a rough experiment here will be of some assistance.

( I ) As you sit reading, shut your eyes and try to think The idea of steadily of the chair in which you sit. You will probably ^ * have, at first, a memory of the printed word ' chair ' which 8 Psychology: What it Is and What it Does