The distribution and functions of mental imagery / by George Herbert Betts.

  • George Herbert Betts
Date:
1909
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The distribution and functions of mental imagery / by George Herbert Betts. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    the group may have a high degree of unreliability because of a small number available for the tests. The latter method has less individual accuracy, but avoids the unreliability which comes from small numbers. No results can be more accurate than the data which go into them; on the other hand, results may be less accurate than full data will give, if the results are generalized from a small number of cases. If a group of subjects has had a reasonable amount of training in introspection; if they thoroughly understand the problem on which they are working; if they are interested and serious; if the experiment is free from suggestions tending to bias judgment;— then results of considerable scientific value may be expected. That material from such a source is not to be despised is shown by the high degree of similarity between the results obtained from the three groups of students in the following tests, and the group of psychologists. Binet has shown in a recent admirable study1 that valuable results can be obtained from even children, if they are carefully instructed and if their attitude toward the work is what it ought to be. After the fitness of the subjects employed in the tests, the next consideration is that of the questions used. Galton’s question¬ naire set a high standard, and possessed many admirable features, especially as related to visual imagery. But it left something to be desired in definiteness and accuracy even in this field, and slighted all the other types of images. The Titchener question¬ naire2 permits loose and general answers, and is far below this author’s usual high demands for scientific accuracy. Questions as to whether one possesses accurate mental pictures of places he has visited; whether, when he thinks of a piano, he calls up a visual image of it, or an auditory image of its tone; whether one recalls music readily; whether one enjoys reading descriptive novels ; whether one has more of visual or of auditory imagery; whether one can tell how many windows there are in the front of a familiar building; whether one can think “ bubble ” without closing the lips,—these and many other questions like them which have been used by various investigators are not calculated to give results which would be considered safe as a basis for generaliza¬ tion in other domains of science. xL’Etude Experimentale de L’Intelligence. Experimental Psychology, Students’ Manual, p. 198.
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