This reminded me of Harris' treatment of logic in his 'Psychologic Foundations.' By thinking of the word psychologic I thought of psychology. That reminded me that I had not yet written out any train of thought." "Yesterday we received a letter from my sister who is off on a yachting trip. One of the men on board is a young fellow who is to be an assistant pastor in the fall. This brought up the church, and then came the school where I teach, which is just beside the church. This brought up one of my old pupils who is now in Germany. Then came an experience that my brother, who has just returned from India, told yesterday of being cheated in a bicycle tire by some German. The thought of my brother suggested India and I thought of some snake stories that he had told about that country. The snakes suggested something I had seen in the morning paper about some albino snakes at Bronx Park." 8. Looking in turn at each of the words printed below (keep all the later words covered by a card until the first, second and so on have been allowed to call up their associations) note and record the fact which it calls up. State the apparent cause for each of the connections made. Memory and the Law of Association.-The terms memory and remember are used to refer to (1) the revival of a mental fact in imagination, (2) the revival of a fact plus the feeling of its having been in one's experience at some time in the past, (3) the revival of the appropriate mental fact in response to a situation, and (4) the revival of a movement or set of movements. The causes of the revival of movements will be stated in Chapter XVIII. The causes of the revival of mental facts are found in the general laws describing the formation and operation of connections between one mental state and another, the revival of mental facts being simply the result of the laws of the association of ideas. The answer that has been given to the question, 'Given any mental state, what idea will be called up?', will answer also the question, 'What decides whether any mental fact shall reappear in memory?' The only need for a separate section on memory is that some new questions arise when the process of mental connection is studied from the point of view of the 'to be recalled fact' rather than from the point of view of the 'mental fact present.' The probability of revival of any mental fact depends upon the strength of the original impression and the number of situations which lead to it. If fact A is impressed deeply, it will by the laws of intensity tend to be called up. If there are a hundred mental states which have led to fact A, it has by the law of association a hundred times the chance of being called up that it would have if there were only one mental state which had led to it. To make sure that a mental fact will reappear, e.g., that you do not forget to write a letter to Mr. A, you may either fix firmly the fact by attending to it, repeating it, etc.; or you may arrange so that many of the day's situations will call up the fact 'Write a letter to Mr. A,' e.g., by saying to yourself: 'After dinner I must write to A. When I get home I must write to A. Before I go to bed I must write to A. Do nothing until A is written to.' To recall a fact we try one after another those facts which have gone with the desired fact in the hope that some one of them will call it up. Thus in trying to think of a certain man's name we think of the different occasions when we have seen and spoken to him, of the things he did, of the persons who also know and may have spoken of him, of his appearance and ways and the like, of names that we feel are like his name. Appropriate Revival.—For practical purposes it is not the mere revival of a mental fact that counts but its revival at the proper situation. To recall this man's name is useless unless it is recalled at the sight of his face. To recall 1763 is useless unless it is recalled in connection with the Treaty of Paris or some other relevant fact. To recall 8.42 is useless unless it is recalled in connection with 'the train goes at.' Thus the problem of memory becomes still more similar to that of the association of ideas in general. In arranging for the revival of a mental fact, we commonly arrange for its connection with a particular situation. We try to make sure that 8 will be thought of and thought of after 4+4; that Shakspere will be thought of and thought of with Hamlet, Lear and Othello. Goodness of memory depends upon the permanence of impressions, the permanence of connections, their number and their nature or arrangement. To have a first class memory one must retain for long the effects of an impression, must retain for long the effects of a connection, must have a goodly number of connections and must have things connected in logical, useful ways. It is better, for instance, to remember amat for a year than for a day and to keep the connection 'he loves is amať' for a year than for a day; to have a hundred such connections rather than one; to have fifty connections like he loves-amat, they love-amant, I love amo, amabat-he was loving, amaverant-they had loved, rather than fifty like amoamas, amas-amat, amat-amamus, amamus-amatis, amatisamant, amant-amabamus. These facts are well illustrated in the stock methods of memorizing; Repetition, Concentration and Recall. Repetition strengthens both the impressions and the connection between them and is easy and natural, but is somewhat wasteful of time. Concentration, or prolonged attention to the fact to be remembered, strengthens the impressions and the connection between them and saves time, but at the expense of effort. Recall (i.e., the expression from within of the fact to be remembered, after one or more impressions of it from without) gains the extra advantage of forming the connection in the way in which it will be required to act later1 and is conceded to be the best method of the three. The general permanence of impressions and connections, the mere retentiveness of the mind, is decided largely by original capacity and the general conditions of bodily health. The permanence of any particular impression or connection depends also upon the degree of attention given to it, its vividness, and the frequency of its repetition. The number of connections depends upon experience or training. The choice of logical and useful connections depends upon experience as directed by the capacity to see the essential elements in situations. Individual Differences in Memory.-Individual differences in the power to remember are among the most striking found in mental life. For some it is a heavy burden to keep in mind the names of a hundred friends, the necessary detail of a single business or profession, 1 The connection required is to think of B on seeing A; it is therefore more useful to practice 'see A think B' rather than 'see A see B.' and perhaps a hundreth part of what is learned. For others there seems no need of more than a casual impression to fix a thing in memory. Of such a one James writes, "He never keeps written note of anything, yet is never at a loss for a fact which he has once heard. He remembers the old addresses of all his New York friends living in numbered streets, addresses which they themselves have long since moved away from and forgotten. He says that he should probably recognize an individual fly, if he had seen him thirty years previous he is, by the way, an entomologist. As an instance of his desultory memory, he was introduced to a certain colonel at a club. The conversation fell upon the signs of age in man. The colonel challenged him to estimate his age. He looked at him, and gave the exact day of his birth, to the wonder of all. But the secret of this accuracy was that, having picked up some days previously an army-register, he had idly turned over its list of names, with dates of birth, graduation, promotions, etc., attached, and when the colonel's name was mentioned to him at the club, these figures, on which he had not bestowed a moment's thought, involuntarily surged up in his mind." These differences are due to (1) differences in the original capacity to retain impressions and connections, (2) differences in interest and (3) differences in the training of the capacity. The excellent memory for names as connected with faces so often found amongst clergymen and politicians is probably a case of interest. Names are attended to and thought over because of the professional interest in them. Many a woman of generally feeble memory can remember every dress she has owned since she was ten years old. The reason that men of poor general capacity to retain do as well as they do in the memory work of science, business and other walks |