Volume 1

Analytic psychology.

  • George Frederick Stout
Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Analytic psychology. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    the recurrent process. The degree of modification at length begins to diminish with each repetition, until the stage of uniform recurrence is reached. This is evidently a true account of the acquisition of facility and precision in com- plicated series of bodily movements ; the effect of practice is shown in the well-marked difference between the performance of the beginner and that of the expert. But, apart from the . special kind of variation which characterises this group of cases, it is of vital importance to note that the transition from attentive to automatic process in itself constitutes a profound change, which cannot be referred merely to the principle of repetition. Obviously some other co-operative factor is required. This concurrent factor is to be found in the essential nature of conation, and more especially in what I have called the teleological aspect of attention. All conative processes cease when and so far as their end is attained. Their end in the teleological sense is, as I have said, also their end as occurrences in time.1 The mode in which this principle comes into play will be best shown by an analysis of special cases. Let us take as our first instance the development of a habit of always performing an act upon a certain occasion—e.g., the custom of answering letters by return of post. At the outset this procedure is prompted by some definite motive, such as the desire to be business-like, or to avoid the trouble arising from procrastination, or to give satis- faction to an ,employer. This motive leads to a conscious decision to perform the act in spite of the seduction of tempta- tions which would otherwise lead to its neglect. But after many repetitions the part played by conscious choice becomes less and less prominent. The original motive falls more and more into the background ; finally, the answering letters by leturn of post becomes a mere matter of course, which takes p. 191.