Mental Development in the Child and the Race
Chapter 14: The Mechanism of Revival: Internal Speech and Song
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THE facts of memory and imagination, now broadly discussed, are capable of closer description, when we come to the analysis of consciousness itself. Each function which has its external habit-aspect in the action of the person, has also its internal habit-aspect in the movements among the elements of content in the mind, which go to make up our 'stream of thought.' A 'cross-section' of the stream at any moment will contain the elements in consciousness which stand for the activities going on, or tending to go on, in the bodily mechanism. And each such element must have its reason for being in the laws of assimilation, association, and thought, already briefly put in evidence.
I shall attempt to show this in more detail by analyzing two so-called 'expressive' functions, both of which are most interesting in themselves, and both of which have had great light thrown upon them in later years: speech and song. The aim shall be, not to give detailed descriptions of the execution of speech and music, but to show what is actually in consciousness at the time of any such execution, and how just this came to be in consciousness.
§ 1. Internal Speech: How do we think of Words?
An important advance has been made in late years in the purely psychological doctrine of memory and imagination.
(410) The old psychology held that all individuals were alike as regards the brain centres for the memory of particular things and for the performance of particular actions. It has been shown, however, by pathological cases and by analysis as well, that we are not alike. Several distinct so-called 'types' have been discovered -- persons who depend mainly on one sense for their memories, and on the memories of this sense mainly for the necessary release of voluntary energy into the muscular combinations used in performing particular actions. The analysis of the speech function has been so brilliant, that I may explain it more in detail, as illustrating the general principle of 'types,' upon which, as I think, the true theory of the rise and development of attention must be based.
The doctrine of brain function in speech is now pretty clear -- thanks to the teaching, principally, of pathological cases. Normal speech is a function which probably involves several so-called 'brain centres,' all in dynamic connection with one another. Given a man with the physical apparatus of the act of speaking intact -- vocal organs, nerve connections, and brain seat of discharge (Broca's gyre) -- and ask why such a man speaks, the answer may take several forms. He may name a word sign which he has seen, or repeat a word sound which he has heard, or tell the words he has written, or finally, he may speak a word simply from the habit of speaking it -- from the tendency of his speech apparatus to operate as it has operated before. Now we ordinarily generalize this diversity in the case in which the man 'thinks' the word merely, without speaking it, by saying that the word is 'in his mind,' internal, intérieur; but the question is: What is in his mind ? -- the printed word (visual image), the spoken word (auditory), the written word (hand-motor), the articulate word (speech-motor) -- is it all of these? Is it any of them?
(411) If we agree to call the motor centre for speech (mp of Fig. XVII., b,, above) the 'intrinsic' seat of stimulation to the organs of speech, and, on the other hand, to call the other centres pointed out 'extrinsic,' the question now current runs: Are these extrinsic centres capable, each for itself, of arousing the speech centre; or does one of them, the centre for sensations and memories of actual movement, the 'kinaesthetic' word centre (mc, of the same figure), always stand between the motor seat and the other sensory centres ?
Or, put psychologically, do we, when we remember words and speak them, always recall them in terms of the sensations of movement involved in speaking or writing them; or is it possible to speak simply from remembering the visual form of the word, or its sound ? Is the kinaesthetic centre, with the memories of movement to which its processes correspond, intrinsic or extrinsic ?
The view that verbal memories are always motor, or kinaesthetic, is associated with the name of Stricker. [1] Recent results have refuted Stricker. A variety of facts have been adduced to show that the function of speech is not dependent in all cases upon the possibility of reinstating motor experiences; although in some cases it is, for patients are reported who could not speak unless they first traced the words with hand or pen. [2] Many of these facts are already common property; but a few of the recent points on this side of the discussion are these: (I) Cases are cited of verbal hallucination, in which the patient hears two or more voices, one of which he takes to be his own, the other that of some one
(412) else; only the former can be accounted for as due to the incipient stimulation of
his own speech centres, the other is
probably auditory. [3] This interpretation is supported by the interesting fact,
established by Pierre Janet, that some patients can themselves speak during their verbal
hallucinations, while others cannot. Again, only of the latter class must we hold that the
motor memories are necessary to speech. [4] Indeed, there is a characteristic difference
between the two classes, -- a difference first pointed out, it seems, by Baillarger --
i.e. with those patients who are able to speak without interrupting the voice which they
hear, we have a hallucination of objective speech: they hear what they think is a real
voice outside them. While the other class have a hallucination of internal speech. They
declare that there is some one inside them, speaking to them. Seglas holds, with evident
truth, that these latter hallucinations are 'psychomotor' [5] in their seat, while the
'objective' kind are auditory. (2) There are cases of aphasia due to impairment of
hearing, the motor centres being intact, i.e. cases of auditory verbal amnesic aphasia.
[6] (3) We recognize and understand words which we are unable to pronounce, and which we
have never written; this recognition must be by aid of visual or auditory images. The part
played by the visual and motor memories respectively, in my own case, is seen in the fact
that when I
(413) wish to speak in any language but English, the German words come first into my mind; but when I sit down to write in a foreign language, French words invariably present themselves. This means that my German is speech-motor and auditory, having been }earned conversationally in Germany, while the French, which was acquired in school by reading and exercise-writing, is visual and hand-motor. [7] It is interesting also to note the joyous recognition which young children show, when they speak a new vowel or consonant sound correctly. The memory of the correct sound cannot, in this case evidently, be from the motor centres. [8] (4) There is evidence of direct functional connection between the visual and auditory mats respectively, and the centre of motor discharge. Here I may best give the words of Janet, who writes in view of the pathological evidence: "This hypothesis is confirmed by investigations on an~esthetic hysterics. In my opinion, it is impossible to explain the fact that these persons preserve their power of movement intact, in spite of the absolute loss of kinesthetic sensations and images, unless we admit that movement may be directly stimulated by visual and auditory pictures. There are individuals with whom the auditory image of a word suffices for its pronunciation." [9] (5) The law of 'dynamogenesis,' in accordance
(414) with which every sensory stimulation tends to bring about a motor discharge, indicates such a direct connection in cases of closely associated function. Féré demonstrates that speaking makes the hand-grasp stronger, that seeing colours and hearing sounds influence the motor centres; so it is altogether probable that stimulations of sight and hearing react directly to stimulate the motor speech centres. [10] (6) Cases may be cited of direct antagonism between memories of words and the sensations produced by the speech movements which they stimulate. The pathological state called paraphasia [11] is duplicated sometimes temporarily in cases of severe headache; one intends to mention one object (chair) and really speaks another (spoon), without detecting the mistake. I have myself had this experience; being quite unable to name correctly an object seen, until some one else has spoken the word with emphasis -- yet all the while allowing my own incorrect word to pass, and feeling astonishment that others have not understood my meaning. Similar are those cases in which patients take their own words for those of some one else, declaring, when questioned, that they themselves did not speak them. [12] Reflection leads us to the view that in these cases there is a direct flow from the auditory or visual centre to the motor speech centre, the kinaesthetic speech centre being, perhaps, temporarily inhibited. The same kind of antagonism is also seen, from the other side, when there is 'exaltation' of the kinaesthetic centre, or what is
(415) called uncontrollable 'verbal impulse.' The patient speaks certain words or phrases in spite of himself -- against his utmost effort to speak something else. [13]
This conception of the case -- not to dwell upon other points of evidence [14] -- seems to harmonize well with the doctrine of nervous function now becoming more and more current. According to this doctrine, the brain is a series of centres of only relatively stable tension; the various associative connections among these centres are paths of less and more, rather than of least and most, resistance; the range of alternative adjustments is excessively wide; and, consequently, any individual has his 'personal equation' in all functions as complex as that of speech. One man is a 'motor,' another a 'visual,' a third an 'auditive,' according as one or another of the extrinsic sources of stimulation suffices to release the necessary energy into his motor speech centre. No one doubts Stricker, therefore, when he says
(416) that he remembers words only by means of sensations of incipient movement; but for the same reason we cannot dispute the claim of Stumpf, and Wernicke, and Kussmaul, and Lichtheim, that auditory and visual images may, in other cases, play an equally leading role.
Endnotes
- Stricker, Ueber die Bewegungsvorstellungen, Ueber die Association der Vorstellungen, Ueber die Sprachvorstellungen, Langage et Musique. See also G. E. Müller, Grundlegung der Psychophysik.
- See Sommer's report on the so-called Grashey case -- a patient named Voit -- in Zeitsch. für Psychologie, II., Heft 3, p. 158, and the citations of Pick, same journal, III., Heft I, p. 50.
- See case of Charcot quoted by Ballet, Le langage intérieur, p. 64, also cases in Seglas, Les troubles du langage chez les alienes, p. 126.
- Cf. Revue Philosophique, November, 1892, P. 520, and Seglas, loc. cit., p. 117 and p. 145. A case is reported of a patient who could stop his internal voice by holding his breath (Annales Psychol., January, 1893, p. 1O3).
- Seglas, loc. cit., p. 147; Janet, loc. cit., who advocates the expression 'kinaesthetic verbal' instead of 'psycho-motor,' as applying to this hallucination of internal speech.
- See cases collected by Ballet, Ioc. cit., pp. 9I-92; also Bastian's case, Brain as Organ of Mind, p. 640; cf. also Paulhan, Revue Philosophique, XXI., pp. 37 ff.
- A similar case, apart from details, is reported by Ballet, loc. cit., p. 62.
- At the risk of too much personality (of which, however, the literature of this topic is necessarily full), I may quote the following about my two-year old child H., written by her aunt, Miss E. L. Baldwin: "She rejoices greatly when she succeeds in sounding a new letter. The other day she achieved 1, and went abaft telling everybody, 'Baby can say sleep and slipper.' This morning I am informed that she can say 'save' and 'give' (letter v). She notices at once herself, when she can pronounce the word as the rest of us do -- no one tells her."
- Pierre Janet, Automatisme Psychologique, p. 60. The common cases of patients who can copy, when they cannot initiate writing and speech, are in evidence.
- Férée cites his results in support of Stricker's contention; see his Sensation et
Mouvement. He fails, however, to distinguish between the direct motor effect of a
sensation, and the indirect motor effect -- i.e. through the kinaesthetic centre, or via
the motor correlations which the attention requires -- this indirect effect being required
by Stricker's view.
- See Seglas' very interesting cases, loc. cit., pp. I50 f,
- Cf. Bastian's cases of 'inco-ordinate amnesia,' Brain as Organ of Mind, pp. 634-638.
- See Seglas on 'hysterical mutism,' loc. cit., pp. 97 f. In dreams this is probably the case: the kinaesthetic centres are no longer inhibited, and we talk meaningless sounds, which in our dream consciousness are interpreted, as rational discourse. In view of all such cases of antagonism, I suggested in an earlier statement of the main considerations on this point (Philos. Review, II., 1893, p. 389), that a distinction was legitimate between psychic and cortical dumbness, corresponding to the current distinction on the sensory side. Just as there is a distinction between being unable to hear words (cortical deafness), and being unable to understand the meanings of words we hear (psychic deafness), so there is a distinction, shown pathologically, between being unable to speak words, and being unable to speak the words we mean. Put in different terminology, the former case would be due to a lesion of the motor elements at the 'second level,' and the latter case to a lesion of the motor connections between the second and the cortical or 'third level.' Compare the allusions made to these differences above, Chap. XIII., § 3, p. 387.
- For instance, cf. Stumpf, Tonpsychologie, I., pp. 160 ff. Further evidence accrues, also, from the consideration of tune memories, which seem to be independent, in many adults, and generally in children, of the singing or playing of the tunes. Cf. above, Chap. VI., § 5, and the next section of this chapter.
§ 2. Internal Song: How do we think of Tunes?
The question of 'internal song' is a newer one. What do we mean when we say that a 'tune is running in our head'? What sort of images are really in consciousness then ?
The factors involved are evidently less complex than those already shown to be involved in speech memory, in the discussion in the preceding paragraph, at the same time that the entire phenomenon is more obscure. Evidence goes to show that the internal tune is almost entirely auditory: that is, that the auditory centre is intrinsic to musical reproduction.
An adequate discussion of the nature of tune reproduction should provide a theory of tune perception which takes account of three factors -- pitch, time or rhythm, timbre -- and possibly of a fourth character, ordinarily designated by the phrase 'musical expression,' or, more properly, emotional tone. [1]
(417) There are certain interesting points of relationship between the process of internal speech and that of 'internal' or remembered music. For example, madly persons find internal tunes generally fuller, more real, and sometimes only tunes at all when vocal movements are involved; either, that is, when they remember the appropriate words, when they have sung the words to the tune, or when they have hummed the refrain aloud. Here there is clearly a motor type of music performers. But this motor requirement is extremely variable. In some cases the tune must be associated with a particular instrument, and this is done only by the reproduction of the proper sensations in the finger tips, lips, etc., used in playing that instrument. On the other hand, there are facts which show that the motor type is only a type, and that even in these cases auditory tune memories are necessary. Musical recognition in childhood often precedes verbal recognition. Musical expression usually precedes verbal expression, both when there is a clearly inherited musical tendency, [1] and in ordinary imitative reactions. [3] In case of 'absolute hearing,' discussed below, we have apparently recognition of pitch without any motor speech or song images. Further, there is the critical fact that motor aphasia, and even verbal deafness, may exist with no impairment of the musical faculty -- no amusia, as defects of musical faculty are called by Brazier. This is true both for musical recognition (case of Wernicke), and for musical expression. [4] Cases show, how-
(418)-ever, that the latter, musical expression, is never lost, without involving speech; although musical recognition seems sometimes, as in Carpenter's case and in Brazier's cases of musical amnesia, to be lost without impairing speech. [5] The conclusion that musical reproduction is auditory is supported also by such facts as the following: that we often recognize an air after hearing it once, even when we have never tried to sing it, and could not if we tried; that in singing or humming a tune, we know that we are wrong even when we are unable to correct it; tune hallucinations without words or vocal quality are reported, and illusions of tunes may be started by accidental sounds; [6] many persons are able to remember and recall musical chords and combinations which it is impossible for the human voice to reproduce, i.e. we can mentally depict harmony; further, there are cases of persons who can recognize the pitch of tones from instruments, but not that of the tones of their own voice. [7] It seems clear, indeed, on the surface, that of the elements distinguished above as essential to musical reproduction -- pitch, rhythm, timbre, and emotional tone -- the most essential, pitch, finds no adequate basis in motor speech or song memories. The range of intonation in speaking and singing is too narrow to supply the material for musical reproduction, although there are, no doubt, individuals whose musical capacity -- especially of expression -- is confined to these limits.
It is probable, accordingly, that there is a brain-centre for
(419) tune memories -- a centre whose impairment produces socalled notal amusia -- that this centre is a part, in function' at least, if not anatomically, of the auditory centre, and that cases will occur of partial amusia in different persons, due to the degree in which this function involves others. [8] This general conclusion is confirmed, I think, by what follows on pitch memory, the only one of the four elements of musical reproduction which is in order here.
Endnotes
- There is not a great deal of literature on this topic: see the following titles: Egger, La
parole interieure; Stricker, Langage et musique; Stumpf, Tonpsychologie, I.,
pp. I35 ff.; Wallaschek, Vierteljahrschrift fur Musikwissenschaft, 1891, Heft I,
and ' Die Bedeutung der Aphasia fur die Musikvorstellung,' Zeitsch. für Psychol.,
VI., Heft I, and his review of my theory in the same journal, VII., Heft I; Wallaschek has
a popular article also in the Contemporary Review, September, 1804; Lotze, Medicinische
Psychologie, p. 480; G. E. Müller, Grundlegung der Psychophysik, p. 288; V.
Franckl-Hochwart, 'Ueber den Verlust der musikalischen Ausdruckvermogens' in Deutsche
Zeitschrift fur Nervenheilkunde, 1891, I., pp. 283-391; Oppenheim,
Charite Annalen, XIII., 1888, 345-383; besides the voluminous literature of aphasia. An interesting late article, full of bibliographical references, is by Brazier, Revue Philosophique, October, 1802, p. 337. For later citations, see the appropriate topics in the writer's Dict. of Philos. and Psychology. - Interesting cases are cited by Ballet, loc. cit., p. 24.
- My child E. imitated a run of three notes, vocally, before she showed any verbal imitations.
- Cf. v. Franckl-Hochwart, loc. cit., I., p. 283.
- Wallaschek, Zt. f. Psych., VII., March, 1893, p. 671, in criticising this statement of mine, cites cases of musical inability through stage-fright, while speech remains, as possible exceptions. I think, however, that stage-fright is such an emotional and interested thing that the inability is not really musical at all, but is rather due to general nervous inhibition.
- Ordinary internal tunes are usually stimulated in this way, as I have said above, Chap. VI., § 5.
- Cases of v. Kries cited below.
- For example, musical deafness without verbal deafness; case of Grant Allen in Mind, III., p. 157, and that of Brazier, loc. cit., p. 359. Bastian, loc. cit., p. 664, quotes a case from Lasegue of an aphasic musician, who could write nothing but passages of music which he had just heard. A recent case of Pick's (Archiv fur Psych., 1892, p. 91O) seems at first sight to give trouble, i.e. a case of loss of musical recognition with no impairment of musical expression. Yet Pick's location of the lesion as subcortical sufficiently accords with the view in the text. The seat of auditory attention was not injured Cf. note on Pick's position, and the theory of 'muscular control,' below, Chap XV., § 4.
§ 3. Pitch Recognition: How do we know Notes?
The recognition of the pitch of notes gives two cases apparently distinct from each other, i.e. 'relative' and 'absolute' pitch recognition. In relative recognition the musical interval seems to supply the real locus of the recognition. Given the initial note and the proper rhythm -- and the rest of the tune comes up by reason of the associated tone intervals, note by note. It is the case of objective recognition by assimilation of content, as already described. [1] Comparatively few persons lack the ability to carry through a familiar tune mentally. Absolute recognition, on the other hand, is a different accomplishment; even among competent musicians it is often [2] conspicuously absent. It is the power of reproducing a note of any desired pitch absolutely from memory.
(420)The auditory character of all relative pitch recognition is shown by the following facts -- in addition to the general considerations already adduced: (I) Brazier [3] cites cases of aphasic patients who could speak words only by singing them: that is, they must first recognize an air, and then arouse the motor speech function from that cue. The motor centre not being available in these cases, it is difficult to see on what but auditory grounds the tune recognition could proceed. It often occurs, in my own case, that I cannot recall the words of a song until I get the tune started. Another case of this kind is cited immediately below. (a) I find it possible, with Paulhan, [4] to think different notes very clearly while the vocal organs are held rigid. I am able to think one note while I am uttering aloud a long-drawn-out vocal sound, say a, in a different pitch. And lest it may be said that it is the overtones which are heard internally in this case, I may add, that I am able with the greatest ease to hold aloud an a sound at c', say, and at the same time to cause a whole tune -- say Yankee-doodle -- to run its course 'in my ear.' Stricker's inability to think one consonant while speaking another is due, probably, to the fact that, in uttering labials, etc., pronounced and explosive muscular combinations are necessary, and that they have no clear auditory character, being usually merged in accompanying vowel sounds. (3) My internal tunes have very decided pitch -- determined upon an instrument in a number of cases. Yet, as I have said above, it is not always the normal pitch of the tune as written and learned, nor is it constant for recurrences of the same tune.
In explaining pitch recognition the question of relative pitch comes first. The very fact that it is relative, means that it may be brought under the law of objective conscious recog-
(421) nition in general. If recognition be due to assimilation, relationship, 'fringe,' in the representation recognized, and vary with the degree of this associative of apperceptive element, then recognition of each note would occur, like the recognition of any other presented content; according as it have or have not a train or fringe of associated elements. A tune is then recognized, because it is such a train. The degree of precision in its recognition depends upon the fineness of discrimination at the original hearing of it. So also the fact that notes are better recognized after the musical notation has been learned, simply means that additional elements are brought into the complex by the notation -- elements which support the claim of the whole. With persons of the motor type, further, the motor speech and song images are prominent in this complex, and so essential, in some cases, that recognition does not occur without them. It seems likely, therefore, that if we grant differences of pitch in tone sensations, the recognition of the associated trains which we call 'tunes' is but an instance of a broader mental phenomenon.
Absolute recognition, on the other hand, or 'absolute hearing,' as it is called, presents anomalies which make it difficult to explain it as an ordinary case of recognition by presented association. Either we must find elements of complexity in such tones or confess that here is an exception to the accepted theory. I have already given the general principles by which this case is to be explained: but it may be well to apply them now to a concrete instance. [5] The question which may be asked is this: Can any one identify a note of any pitch simply and only from the tone-quality of the note itself ?
One of the latest contributions to this question is from
(422) v. Kries, [6] who is himself a musician. He possesses the so-called absolute hearing. He also publishes details supplied from other similar cases. He argues that the ability to identify a single isolated note cannot be due to musical practice, i.e. cannot be a refinement of interval recognition, [7] because (I) he has had this power from early boyhood, as also have others whom he cites; (2) some of the most celebrated musicians have not been able to acquire it at all, although their sense of interval became wonderfully acute; and (3) the power in himself and others varies with the instrument which sounds the note, and is not best with the instruments most used. He recognizes notes from the piano best, also from string and wind instruments, especially the violin, but not those from tuning-forks, or steam and other whistles, or notes sung or whistled with the lips -- a state of things shown with some variations also in several of his correspondents. Now the violin is with v. Kries a late accomplishment, while he has of course, been hearing singing all his life, accompanying singers on the piano from his twelfth year, and whistling habitually. Indeed, these last facts -- showing the influence of timbre on pitch recognition -- lead him to deny that there are any revived images of any kind belonging intrinsically to musical recognition. He finds it to be a case of the 'association by naming ' as established by Lehmann; that is, v. Kries was not able to recognize notes until after, in boyhood, he had learned their names and written signs. The case is analogous, therefore, he holds, to the recognitions which Lehmann found to follow from the simple lettering and naming of shades of wool not before separately recognized.
This conclusion of v. Kries is lame, I think. It does not
(423) account for the differences due to timbre mentioned above; for the notation is the same practically for all the instruments and for the voice. v. Kries admits this, and says it remains for the future to provide a theory of this influence due to timbre -- leaning, however, as he does, to the overtone theory. Further, he agrees with other observers in finding that chords are better recognized than single notes; this would indicate that recognition is due in some way to the complexity and variety of the tone content, rather than to the accident of naming. It is possible, perhaps, to give due weight to the influence of the name association in a theory which does more justice to the essential facts. This and other cases of the recognition of apparently isolated sense qualities can be brought, I think, under the law of 'sensorimotor association' made out above,[8] according to which the recognition is due simply to the modification of the <MATH>&alpha</MATH> element in the formula of attention, i.e. to the relative ease of adjustment of the attention to one particular tone-pitch as such.
Several considerations may be urged in favour of this view: (1) It brings absolute and relative tone recognition under a single principle; the former arises on the motor side, the latter on the sensory, or content side, of the one process; (2) it accounts for the greater relative ease of recognition of chords and compound tones; apart from their complexity of content, they carry greater and more varied dynamogenic influence; (3) it makes it possible to consider tone recognition in some cases hereditary, as the facts (i.e. cases of v. Kries and others) seem to require; persons have from birth a tendency to give the attention with greater facility to one class of stimulations than to another -- so the doctrine of
(424) types teaches. Why may not this difference extend also to different notes? The analysis given above of the speech function leads us to see what refinements are possible in the recognition of words. Even the recognition of particular classes of words, as nouns, may be lost while other words are correctly used. Brazier cites a case in which the visual time notation of written music was retained while the pitch notation in the same music was lost. A corresponding native refinement on the motor side, i.e. in the attention, is all that this theory requires, that is, if we are right in considering the attention to involve refined motor adjustments. Refinements on the sensory side, as seen in association, are dependent, indeed, upon refinements on the motor side. The variations in motor reactions are the winnowing, selecting agents in all mental progress; (4) it enables us to explain the apparent influence of timbre, a fact not explained by any other theory. The fact that isolated tones from some instruments are recognized, while from others they are not, I hold to arise from differences in the type of attention exerted in the several cases respectively. A 'visual' musician is most likely to recognize tones from instruments whose manipulation or notation involves much visual attention; an 'auditive,' notes from those which exercise hearing in most varied and exclusive ways; and a 'motor,' notes from those in connection with which muscular attention is at its best. It is remarkable that in all of v. Kries's recognitions, the method of learning is probably by visual note-reading, -- piano, violin, etc., -- while his non-recognitions -- his own voice, voice of others, steam whistles, lip-whistling, etc. -- are apparently in cases in which the essential indications do not include such systematic visual attention. Now on the supposition that v. Kries is a 'visual,' i.e. that the pitch elements of the attention in his case are most readily stimulated from the centre
(425) for sight, we have a clear application of our law. [9] Further, v. Kries was unable to recognize tones before he learned musical notation, which, it is natural to suppose, was at first visual. The case of musical alexia already quoted from Brazier shows the importance of a single class of notation memories, although that case involved the loss, not of tone recognition, but of musical execution; [10] (5) one of v. Kries's cases of 'absolute hearing' seems to be, from what he reports of it, motor in type: a young woman who recognized tones when sung only by means of 'internal repetition,' to herself, of the notes sung (das Bedürfniss bestand, sie innerlich nachzusingen). [11] This innerliches Nachsingen, in a case where the real note is already heard, is probably motor, a supposition supported by the fact that the woman was a 'skilful singer herself.' Her quicker recognition of piano tones might be because of the motor practice in hand execution; (6) this point of view affords us an additional reason for the fact, which all admit, that the best recognitions are for notes of moderate pitch, -- not very high or very low; for, being of most frequent occurrence, these notes exercise the attention most, and so get most easily and readily accommodated to. And it is also easy to see that, for this reason, their discrimination becomes finer and better; (7) in the experiments already referred to, Féré found different dynamogenic effects to follow the hearing of the different notes of the musical scale, and the greatest effect to follow the notes in the middle of the gamut; if true, this is nothing short of a demonstration of variations in the <math>&alpha</math> element in attention, for different pitches.
Finally, if 'motor associates' be at the bottom of pure-
(426) tone recognition, we would expect something of the same kind in the case of colour and odour qualities. This is the sphere of Lehmann's results in Benennungsassociation to which v. Kries appeals. Now Féré claims to have demonstrated this point also, i.e. that colour discrimination and recognition are improved by muscular exercise. He found it possible to bring back purple recognition to purple-blind hysterics, simply by muscular movement. It is a ready deduction, also, from the opposite fact that the different colours, beginning with red, have diminishing dynamogenic effect as measured on the squeeze-dynamometer.
The details now cited, in the case of speech and tune revival, may be taken as detailed examples of the application of the general theory of assimilation to detailed instances. The position of the theory as regards recognition of tones may be stated in the words of James, quoted from his review of my earlier article: "It offers a basis of mediation between the two theories of Recognition over which Hoffding and Lehmann have recently waged war. One theory, stated in its radical form, says that a thing looks familiar to us when it recalls to us its past self. The other theory says it looks or sounds familiar when it recalls its past surroundings. The difficulty with the latter view is, that the supposed surroundings fail to become explicitly conscious when the recognition is confined to the bare 'sense of familiarity.' How do we know, then, that they are at all tending to revive? But Professor Baldwin, in making them sink to the level of mere motor associates of former acts of attention, gives a good reason why our consciousness of them should be so indistinct, and why at the same time we should so unmistakably greet the sensory experience which they accompany as one already ours." [12]
(427)
An informal criticism by Professor Höffding is answered in another place.[13] Wallaschek
[14] objects to my view, that as all persons have the requisite factors, all should have
absolute tone recognition. But the reason they do not is, I think, not a fault of their
reproduction, but of their perception. Some cannot recognize tones again, because they do
not clearly distinguish them in the first instance. All possible variations, from the best
to the poorest discrimination of tones, would give corresponding variations in the
facility of recognition.
It may be well to note, finally, that one among the minor questions to which this theory of sensori-motor association suggests answers, is that of so-called 'paramnesia,' -- the false recognition of new localities, interiors, etc., the sense that an event has happened to one before. It may be due to the artificial or accidental stirring up of an old attention series. Any new experience which gives approximately the same strains, etc., in the attention complex, as an earlier experience, would seem familiar, at the same time that it might not be nor seem objectively identical.
Endnotes
- Chap. X., § 3.
- In the case of some of those who carry tuning-forks in their pockets.
- Loc. cit., p. 366.
- Loc. cit.
- See above, Chap. X., § 3.
- 'Das absolute Gehör,' in Zeitschrift für Psychologie und Physiologie der Sinnesorgane, III., 192, p. 257.
- So Stumpf, loc. cit., I., p. 280.
- Chap. X., § 3. Instead of Höffding's sentence (Phil. Stud., VIII., p. 90), 'die organische Functionen gehen leichter' in absolute recognition' I should say, the psycho-physical function of attention 'goes easier.'
- Of course, such an application is only an illustration; the details of the individual's life and education -- the questions 'why ?' and 'to what extent ? he is visual, motor, etc. -- make any single case extremely complex.
- Loc. cit., p. 363.
- Loc. cit., p. 273
- The Psychological Review, I., 1894, p. 210.
- See Chap. XV., § 4, footnote.
- Zt. für Psych., VII., March, 1894, p. 68.
