will be hypotheses about physiological traces. Furthermore, each of
these theories will have to assume that the properties of the traces
correspond more or less to those of the processes by which they were
produced. Otherwise we should not be able to explain the accuracy of
reproduction which in a great many cases is very high. In _gestalt_
psychology we state at once the assumption that, as far as the original
process (and the experience which may have accompanied it) has been
organized in a definite manner, its trace must have similar properties
of organization, in general. Take the examples given in Chapter VI
where the concept of “real form” was considered. If certain segregated
wholes with definite forms are experienced in our field of vision, the
aspect of one of them later on may reproduce other experiences which
had been present at the same time. But if, for some reason, instead of
that particular organization, grouping and form, we experience other
wholes with their real forms, no reproduction will occur, though the
same, or almost the same, stimuli may be given us. So the number 4 will
reproduce its name when written in a certain environment (cf. p. 209),
but when Fig. 10 is shown to an unprejudiced subject, this name will
not occur at all. On the other hand, if the subject has once found the
4 in that figure, which means that 4 has now become a segregated whole,
he will consequently find it again easily, and reproduce the name.
From this it follows that the traces of past experiences are neither
an indifferent continuum nor a mosaic of independent points; rather
they must be pictures of past organization. As such they take part in
processes of reproduction.
This same property of the traces may be deduced from recognition.
When Rubin induced his subjects at the first presentation to see
certain pictures in a definite distribution of figure and ground,
they recognized them very well if, afterwards, the same organization
was favored by the conditions of the experiment. If, however, in the
second presentation what had been figure before became ground, and
vice versa, the subjects found unknown forms in the field, i.e.,
failed to recognize, though the constellation of stimuli was the same
throughout. Here again the traces are shown to correspond entirely to
past organization, and not to the aggregate of past stimuli. We may go
a little further: In most cases of reproduction the reproduced material
itself appears as organized. This is true not only of “images,” but
also of motor “melodies” with which we are well acquainted, as Michotte
and van der Veldt have shown most vividly in a recent book.[51]
Readers who have visual images will easily find that their image of a
definite individual tree is detached from the dim environment, as a
figure-whole possessing a real form. Of course, in “free imagination”
and in dreaming the field given us may be very different from any
sensory experience we have ever had before. Nevertheless, even the
oddest creations of dreaming will remain figures, groups or events,
which, whether very definite in shape or not, exhibit all the essential
properties of organization.
So decisive will organization be in a tremendous number of cases that
we may change the stimuli in the most radical manner and still get the
same recognition or the same reproduction, if only the essential traits
of the organization in question remain the same. A melody is recognized
in a key which may not contain a single tone of its first presentation.
Or again, some days after we have heard it the first time we find
ourselves humming it spontaneously in a changed key. Here all the
factors excepting organization seem to be indifferent for reproduction.
I hardly need mention the fact that an unknown figure seen to-day
in red color somewhat to the left of the point of fixation and in a
definite size, will be recognized without difficulty if to-morrow it
appears as green or yellow, somewhat to the right and in quite another
size.[52] Evidently, then, recognition and reproduction deal with the
organization of past events as much or rather more than with local
effects of stimulation, which are assumed as the parts of past events
in mosaic theory. We shall come back to this point later on.
From this viewpoint some facts can be explained which would remain
perplexing if we did not recognize the reality of organization. When
we experiment on delayed reaction in animals we find that some of them
are able to choose the right object, let us say among three equal
ones before them, after a delay of many seconds or even some minutes;
though at the time when the delay is over and we release the animal,
the right object does not exhibit any peculiar traits, as it did before
the delay. If, during the delay, the animal remains directed towards
the right object, his correct choice is not very astonishing. A real
problem arises in the case in which the animal moves freely in his
cage during the delay and still assumes the right direction after we
release it. It has been said that in such a case the animal’s reaction
depends upon some internal cue. This is true insofar as there would
be no reason at all for the right reaction after the delay without
some after-effect of previous stimulation (for instance, the aspect
of food) which at that time made one object a particular thing. That
after-effect is undoubtedly an internal cue. But when, after the
delay and after accidental movements of the animal, the internal cue
works the right way, there must be some characteristic of the right
object by which it can be discriminated. This something cannot be
discovered when we examine each object by itself, because in exact
experimentation they all have the same properties. Still there is
some difference between them, and this difference is the rôle which
each object plays in the group. One is the left end, one the right
end, and one the middle or interior part of the group. If, with that
after-effect as an internal cue, the animal reacts after the delay, the
only property (of the right object) which can make the animal refer its
cue to the right object is _the place of that object in the group of
three objects_.[53] The particular stimulus (the food, for instance,
or a light, as in Hunter’s famous experiments) which was given at the
beginning of the delay has operated as a distinguishing mark of one
definite and well characterized member of the group (let us say, of
the first to the right in a single case). Therefore, after the delay,
the group, and that definite rôle which just one member of it plays
in sensory process, is able to work upon the cue and to produce the
right reaction. In this sense delayed reaction to one among several
objects, having identical properties as isolated objects, involves
the principles of organization and cannot be understood without them.
This becomes even more obvious, perhaps, when we consider the multiple
choice method which Yerkes has used with so much success. There it is
evidently the definite rôle of one object in a group which has become
connected with a definite reaction and consequently will reproduce that
reaction whatever may be the position of the group.
The main interest of experimental psychology has not been directed
toward the nature of the traces which are left in the nervous system
after the original processes have faded away. When we say that the
traces of organized processes must be organized themselves, we do not
seem to have mentioned the most important feature of memory, habit
and so forth, namely, that those traces are _connected_ in the manner
which is generally called their “association” and which leads to the
reproduction of the second when the first is activated by a repetition
of its process. That there are traces is one basic factor of habit,
etc. But if two processes, A and B, have occurred frequently together,
reactivation of the trace of A is said to reactivate B in consequence
of a curious bond between them created by those past events. This is
the second basic factor of habit, and almost all the classical research
on memory has dealt with the formation of that bond and its career
in the course of time. There is almost no other phase of our science
of which we are prouder than this, because here methods have been
developed and laws have been found which may almost be compared with
those of the natural sciences.
In some respects this pride seems fully justified to me, though at the
present time we have begun to realize that we have used those excellent
methods to investigate inconsiderately a special type of memory and
habit and that we should not apply the results obtained to everyday
memory and habit. There is one problem, however, which was not made an
object of those experiments because it did not seem at first to be a
problem. Indeed, it was presupposed as a fact that the mere repetition
of two processes, A and B, having occurred frequently together, would
create that curious bond, the association, between them. This concept
of association shall be discussed in the following paragraphs.
The law of association just mentioned has been considered particularly
satisfactory, due to the purely mechanical character of its content,
which does not in the least imply mystical forces or anything else
foreign to the ideals of natural science. I must confess, however,
that just from the viewpoint of natural science the law of contiguity
appears rather strange to me. A and B happen to occur together and,
whatever the nature of A and B may be, the bond is produced between
them! I do not know a single law or rule in physics or chemistry which
might be compared in this respect with the concept of association. I
repeat what was said in Chapter IV: Wherever an A and B have anything
to do with each other in physics, the effect is found to depend upon
the properties of A and B in their relations to each other. This is the
case in astronomy where acceleration depends upon the masses of A and
B. It is the case in electrostatics where the occurrence of attraction
or repulsion depends upon the nature of electric charges. In chemistry
we find the violent reaction or indifference of atoms determined by
the relation of their properties in the given case. But there is not a
single example of an effect produced by the interaction of two things
or processes quite independently of their properties. Nevertheless this
is the character of the classical law of association, as we find it
stated in most textbooks.
At this point we return to that trait of mosaic theory which we have
found so characteristic of its treatment of sensory processes. If the
distribution and direction of events in the central nervous system
are determined dynamically by interaction in the field, they must
depend upon “the relative properties” of those processes which exert
influences upon each other. This is excluded in principle by the mosaic
theory of the sensory field. Sensation processes are assumed to be
indifferent to each other in general, so that, with regard to them,
any pattern may exist equally well in the field. Exactly the same
assumption of discrete bits of process, altogether indifferent to each
other, underlies the classical concept of association for, without even
mentioning the actual properties of A and B in their relations to each
other, it states that _any_ A and _any_ B may acquire that neutral
bond, if it is supposed only that they occur together a number of times.
It seems to me that, even at the present time and before any
experimental research has been specially directed upon this question,
we may say confidently that, in this point at least, the concept of
association is opposed to a large number of well-known facts. In order
to corroborate this claim, we have only to gather statements scattered
in papers, the authors of which have worked with the classical methods
and the classical nonsense syllables, which their subjects had to
commit to their memories.
We see at once that in a series of these syllables the A and B
(i.e., two syllables following each other) cannot remain altogether
indifferent to each other, since by a simple experiment we can prove
that A and B are not even indifferent to F and G and H and so forth
(i.e., to members remote in the series). When a subject is told to
write down six syllables which we read to him quickly, he is usually
able to comply. But if, instead of six, we give him a series of twelve
syllables, the result is that on the average less than six are written
down. This argues a mutual disturbance which indicates that even
syllables rather distant in time are not indifferent to each other.
If after some repetitions we test the subject, giving him single
syllables and instructing him to name the following one in each case,
our procedure is based upon the assumption that there are a number
of independent associations and reproductions, the results admitting
a statistical treatment. This does not seem to be altogether correct
insofar as it neglects a more general interdependence. It may be
neglected whenever this interdependence is the same statistically in
all the series and when the problems under investigation are the usual
ones. However, as soon as the nature of association itself becomes a
problem, we must be more careful.
In a more striking manner the same warning may be deduced from what
happens to a series of syllables during learning. The subjects read
them in a definite and rhythmical distribution which, usually, consists
of larger wholes, containing sub-units. At the same time the reading
will assume the character of a melody, the pitch of the voice going
up and down, following that grouping exactly.[54] Evidently, a process
of organization occurs during learning and most of all during the
first readings of the series. If that be so, the syllables ought to
acquire a definite “flavor” which belongs to them insofar as they have
a particular place in the larger whole. This consequence is verified
perfectly in those cases in which, after learning a series as a whole,
the subjects are shown the same syllables in another sequence. In the
new order _they look or sound new or strange_. A similar implication
is to be found in the highly important concept of “association with
place,” which means that a syllable is learnt as having a definite
place, not absolutely but with respect to the whole series in which
it occurs. Objectively, the rôle of organization is most convincingly
proved if, after learning the whole series completely so that it is
repeated as a whole without hesitation, the subjects are shown single
syllables in order to reproduce the following one in each case. It has
been found by Nagel that scarcely one-third of the reproductions was
achieved under these circumstances.[55] When given alone, a syllable is
obviously not the same thing as it is in the stream of the organized
series.
Nonsense syllables were chosen by Ebbinghaus and his successors
as the best material for investigating associations, because they
wished to keep their experiments free from the older, already-formed
associations which, if “meaningful” material were employed, would
influence the results in an uncontrolled manner. Furthermore, nonsense
syllables seemed to be a more uniform material than any other. It
would be altogether unjust if we should deny the value of the great
impulse which psychology received from that method. It seems, however,
that the early investigators used this method in a somewhat one-sided
manner. The most valuable observations, perhaps, were made after the
one-sidedness of the original point of view was discovered.
Some psychologists have criticized the method of Ebbinghaus in that it
does not at all investigate automatic associations, whereas the results
of the method are formulated as though that were the case. Indeed, if
the mere neighborhood of the syllables is supposed to produce their
association, most experiments using this material are far from testing
such a pure association, since the subject does not simply receive a
succession of syllables, but rather _is asked to learn them_. If he
follows this instruction, some factor takes part in what is built up
during learning, and this factor is not even mentioned when the results
are formulated in terms of automatic associations. Undoubtedly, here
is a flaw in the scientific procedure. The mistake is a grave one for
it has been shown that without that factor the learning of series of
nonsense syllables would be almost impossible.[56]
But what are the subjects doing when they try to learn a series
intentionally? No one is better authorized to give an answer to
this question than G. E. Müller, who has spent a large part of his
scientific life studying the rules of association and reproduction. His
answer is: “A series of figures, consonants, syllables and so forth,
is learned essentially by our combining the members of the series
in an attitude of synthesis, so that they become solid groups.”[57]
We have seen in an earlier chapter that by a corresponding attitude
one may favor definite forms of grouping, and that the products of
this procedure may be just as real as any spontaneous organization
is. Following the statement of Müller, we may say, therefore, that
intentional learning essentially means intentional organizing.
Though such an attitude seems to be almost necessary in the case of
nonsense material and, most of all, of syllables, it is not needed
evidently where the material has other properties. Time and again we
find ourselves reproducing events from our past experience, where
the incentive to reproduction has certainly not been _intentionally_
combined with what we are now able to reproduce. If that be so, we
must draw the conclusion that the nonsense material used in classical
investigations may be excellent in some respects from the viewpoint of
exactness, but that it cannot teach us the whole truth about so-called
associations. These are not formed in the same manner when, instead
of the classical material, we have to deal with the more natural
experiences of everyday life.
If now we ask ourselves, whether _all_ our experiences outside the
laboratory associate themselves spontaneously, so that the evocation of
one may reproduce its neighbors, we must confess that this is not the
case. We may hear a telephone number dozens of times together with a
name and still remain unable to reproduce it when the name occurs later
on. In this case conditions seem to be similar to those present in the
case of nonsense syllables. The name and the number are as indifferent
to each other as are those syllables usually. Thus the suspicion
arises that we may have spontaneous association where organization
is spontaneous, and that intentional combining is needed where the
material in itself is but slightly organized.
This assumption is corroborated by the well-known fact that meaningful
nouns form associations much more easily than nonsense material. In
this case, of course, the nouns appear as imbued with their meanings
by a process of learning accomplished in our childhood. When as
adult subjects we learn a series of nouns we find these meanings
ready-made, and obviously now it is these _meanings_ which are so
easily associated. But why should they be? At the present time most
psychologists will answer that this is a consequence of their having
been previously associated, so that the actual process of learning
has only to strengthen some particular bond between the meanings of a
pair of nouns which existed a long time before. But at this point the
difference between _gestalt_ psychology and associationism becomes
striking. Let somebody read the following pairs of nouns a few times,
with an attentive attitude: lake-sugar, boot-plate, girl-kangaroo,
pencil-gasoline, palace-bicycle, railroad-elephant, book-toothpaste.
Learning will be considerably easier here than if the same number
of nonsense syllables were given. Can one really say that between
lake and sugar, palace and bicycle, and so forth, there are old
associations which just need some slight exercise and which thereupon
facilitate the learning? It seems to me that we cannot, mainly because
the same words have occurred thousands of times in other much more
regular connections, which ought absolutely to inhibit the _assumed_
associations in this particular case. But there is another explanation.
When I read those words I may imagine as a (very strange) picture, how
a lump of sugar might dissolve in a lake, how a boot might rest on a
plate, how a girl might feed a kangaroo, and so forth. If this happens
during reading I shall have experienced some well organized though
quite unusual wholes, and it may be that here learning is so easy,
because _organizing_ is so much easier in this case than in that of
indifferent nonsense syllables. In order to exclude the possibility
of frequent similar combinations in the past, I have chosen strange
pairs of nouns, the meanings of which may be organized into larger
wholes (pictures), but do not do so quite spontaneously. It seems to
me that those combinations and sequences which become even more easily
associated in everyday life are simply cases of strong spontaneous
organization.
We may say, then, that in one respect nonsense syllables constitute the
worst material which might be chosen for discovering essentially what
association is. As they do not spontaneously form well-characterized
organizations, the nature of spontaneous association will not become
apparent to the psychologist who uses them. Furthermore, as the series
of syllables are built up in a haphazard manner, one cannot even
examine the way in which learning depends upon what may be called the
structure of a series. Even though it be composed of nonsense material
throughout, a series may be constructed in a great many different
ways. Syllables may be chosen which fit together phonetically in a
very characteristic way, or the contrary may be done. Some pairs may
be constructed according to one principle, some according to another.
The whole series may exhibit an extraordinarily striking principle of
structure or it may be an indifferent series, as are the usual ones.
All these variations of material ought to be examined in order to see
whether or not organization is the essential fact underlying so-called
association. From the trend of the foregoing discussion, we should be
inclined to say that it is.
As a last argument in favor of this thesis we may mention the fact
that, sometime after learning a series of members by combining them
into pairs, for instance, the subjects will be able to reproduce the
second members of these pairs rather easily, if the first members are
given them as stimuli to reproduction, whereas, on the other hand, the
number of right reproductions will be small if we present the second
members of pairs and ask for the following serial items which are the
first members of the next successive pairs or groups. If we suppose
that during learning the members of the whole series objectively formed
a uniform sequence as to spatial and temporal intervals, this result
makes it evident that the old rule of association is superficial
and that the conditions of association are ambiguous as long as we
do not take into account the organization of the material. We get
strong association only in those parts of a series where organization
is also strong. It is true that neighborhood or proximity in space
and time is a factor of great importance in association. But it does
not seem to operate directly. In an earlier chapter we saw that the
factor of neighborhood is one of the conditions upon which depend
grouping and the segregation of wholes. From what we have just
stated it would follow, then, _that neighborhood in space and time
influences association only insofar as it determines organization_.
Since this condition is just one among a great many others determining
organization, and since organization seems to be the really decisive
condition of association, the rule of association has to be
reformulated accordingly.