A first book in psychology / by Mary Whiton Calkins.

  • Mary Whiton Calkins
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A first book in psychology / by Mary Whiton Calkins. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    image of a Roman trireme, the association is not between consciousness of salt ship and of Roman trireme as total experiences, for I surely have not been conscious of them at one time or in immediate succession on each other. But neither does this association start from any single feature of the perceived ship. Rather, a highly complex combination of elements (falling short, however, of a concrete total) — the consciousness of dark hull, of masts, and of rigging — is common both to the perception and to the imagination; and these factors common to both experiences are associated with the images, cerebrally excited, of banks of oars and Roman figures, which complete the consciousness of the trireme. It has thus been shown that the partial, like the total, association is accounted for by the assumed identity of associated experiences with earlier experiences; but that these recurring experiences, instead of being concrete wholes, are either elements or groups of elements, which have been combined in former perceptions or imaginings — of*peal- ing bells and of Roman trireme, for example. An association should always, therefore, be analytically studied. The im¬ portant point is the determination of its first term, and the common error is the supposition that a complex experience is invariably to be taken as a whole in tracing the associative connection. On the other hand, as we have seen, all sub¬ tler associations are instances of association between more or less elemental parts of total experiences. Undoubtedly the greater number of associations are of the total sort — associations between consciousness of object and of use, between the percept of a face and the image of a name, and between the terms of verbal and motor series. But the
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