The will-temperament and its testing / by June E. Downey.

  • June Downey
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The will-temperament and its testing / by June E. Downey. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    every modification registered, shall be able to determine where instinct ends and habit begins, and determine the relative potency of heredity and envi¬ ronment. A beginning of such absolutely essential analysis has been made by Dr. John B. Watson. The procedure he has initiated will, if carried out thoroughly, not only inform us concerning the in¬ herited instincts that govern behavior but also reveal to us the degree to which different instincts vary in strength in different individuals. This latter problem is a fundamental one in the study of varieties in human personalities, for if dif¬ ferent instincts vary greatly in strength in different individuals we have discovered undoubtedly a very deep-cutting difference and one which may suggest the type of organization to be anticipated. For example, a strong flight instinct in combination with a weak fighting one would definitely color the whole personality. It might even motivate the development of intelligence, since the timid indi¬ vidual, being continually on guard, would have motives for paying attention to details in his environment—such as a frown on a companion’s face or a flicker of fire—that would escape his fear¬ less companion, confident of his ability to extinguish either frown or fire if a real emergency should arise. It is your friend who is temperamentally on the defensive who cultivates both philosophy and policy; it is the one who is temperamentally on the aggres¬ sive who launches airships and social revolutions. The organization of native tendencies into habit- Habit ob¬ scures in¬ stincts Individual differences in instinct A strong in¬ stinct of fear will color the whole person¬ ality
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