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Applied Psychology
DRIVING
POWER OF THOUGHT
_Being the Third of a Series of
Twelve Volumes on the Applications
of Psychology to the Problems of
Personal and Business
Efficiency_
BY
WARREN HILTON, A.B., L.L.B.
FOUNDER OF THE SOCIETY OF APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY
ISSUED UNDER THE AUSPICES OF
THE LITERARY DIGEST
FOR
The Society of Applied Psychology
NEW YORK AND LONDON
1920
COPYRIGHT 1914
BY THE APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY PRESS
SAN FRANCISCO
(_Printed in the United States of America_)
CONTENTS
Chapter Page
I. JUDICIAL MENTAL OPERATIONS
VITALIZING INFLUENCE OF CERTAIN IDEAS 3
WORK OF PRINCE, GERRISH, SIDIS, JANET, BINET 4
THE TWO TYPES OF THOUGHT 5
II. CAUSAL JUDGMENTS
ELEMENTARY CONCLUSIONS 9
FIRST EFFORT OF THE MIND 10
DISTORTED EYE PICTURES 11
ELEMENTS THAT MAKE UP AN IDEA 12
CAUSAL JUDGMENTS AND THE OUTER WORLD 13
III. CLASSIFYING JUDGMENTS
THE MARVEL OF THE MIND 17
THE INDELIBLE IMPRESS 18
HOW IDEAS ARE CREATED 19
THE ARCHIVES OF THE MIND 22
IV. THE FOUR PRIME LAWS OF ASSOCIATION
THE SEEMING CHAOS OF MIND 27
PREDICTING YOUR NEXT IDEA 28
THE BONDS OF INTELLECT 29
BRANDS AND TAGS 32
HOW EXPERIENCE IS SYSTEMATIZED 33
HOW LANGUAGE IS SIMPLIFIED 34
PROCESSES OF REASONING AND REFLECTION 35
V. EMOTIONAL ENERGY IN BUSINESS
IDEAS THAT STIMULATE 39
PIVOTAL LAW OF BUSINESS PASSION 40
ENERGIZING EMOTIONS 41
CROSS-ROADS OF SUCCESS OR FAILURE 42
THE LIFE OF EFFORT 43
THE MOTIVE POWER OF PROGRESS 44
THE VALUE OF AN IDEA 45
THE HARD WORK REQUIRED TO FAIL 46
CREATIVE POWER OF THOUGHT 47
CONSCIOUS AND UNCONSCIOUS TRAINING 48
TWO WAYS OF ATTACKING BUSINESS PROBLEMS 49
CUTTING INTO THE QUICK 50
EXECUTIVES, REAL AND SHAM 51
MENTAL ATTITUDE OF ONE'S BUSINESS 52
PSYCHOLOGICAL ENGINEERING 53
VI. HOW TO SELECT EMPLOYEES
A CLUE TO ADAPTABILITY 57
MAPPING THE MENTALITY 58
THE KIND OF "HELP" YOU NEED 59
TESTS FOR DIFFERENT MENTAL TRAITS 60
TEST OF UNCONTROLLED ASSOCIATIONS 61
TEST FOR QUICK THINKING 62
MEASURING SPEED OF THOUGHT 63
RANGE OF MENTAL TESTS 64
TESTS FOR ARMY AND NAVY 65
TESTS FOR RAILROAD EMPLOYEES 66
WHAT ONE FACTORY SAVED 67
PROFESSOR MUeNSTERBERG'S EXPERIMENTS 68
TESTS FOR HIRING TELEPHONE GIRLS 69
MEMORY TEST 71
TEST FOR ATTENTION 72
TEST FOR GENERAL INTELLIGENCE 74
TEST FOR EXACTITUDE 76
TEST FOR RAPIDITY OF MOVEMENT 77
TEST FOR ACCURACY OF MOVEMENT 78
RESULTS OF EXPERIMENTS 79
THEORY AND PRACTICE 85
HOW TO IDENTIFY THE UNFIT 87
MEANS TO GREAT BUSINESS ECONOMIES 88
ROUND PEGS IN SQUARE HOLES 89
THE DANGER IN TWO-FIFTHS OF A SECOND 90
PICKING A PRIVATE SECRETARY 91
FINDING OUT THE CLOSE-MOUTHED 92
A TEST FOR SUGGESTIBILITY 93
SELECTING A STENOGRAPHER 95
TESTS FOR AUDITORY ACUITY 96
A TEST FOR ROTE MEMORY 97
A TEST FOR RANGE OF VOCABULARY 100
CRIME-DETECTION BY PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTS 105
THE FACTORY OPERATIVE'S ATTENTION POWER 106
KINDS OF TESTING APPARATUS 108
ANALYSIS OF DIFFERENT CALLINGS 109
EXERCISES FOR DEVELOPING SPECIAL FACULTIES 110
PRINCIPLES THAT BEAR ON PRACTICAL AFFAIRS 111
CHAPTER I
JUDICIAL MENTAL OPERATIONS
[Sidenote: _Vitalizing Influence of Certain Ideas_]
One of the greatest discoveries of modern times is the impellent
energy of thought.
That every idea in consciousness is energizing and carries with it an
impulse to some kind of muscular activity is a comparatively new but
well-settled principle of psychology. That this principle could be
made to serve practical ends seems never to have occurred to anyone
until within the last few years.
[Sidenote: _The Work of Prince, Gerrish, Sidis, Janet, Binet_]
Certain eminent pioneers in therapeutic psychology, such men as
Prince, Gerrish, Sidis, Janet, Binet and other physician-scientists,
have lately made practical use of the vitalizing influence of certain
classes of ideas in the healing of disease.
We shall go farther than these men have gone and show you that the
impellent energy of ideas is the means to all practical achievement
and to all practical success.
Preceding books in this Course have taught that--
I. _All human achievement comes about through some form of bodily
activity._
II. _All bodily activity is caused, controlled and directed by the
mind._
III. _The mind is the instrument you must employ for the
accomplishment of any purpose._
[Sidenote: _The Two Types of Thought_]
You have learned that the fundamental processes of the mind are the
Sense-Perceptive Process and the Judicial Process.
So far you have considered only the former--that is to say,
sense-impressions and our perception of them. You have learned through
an analysis of this process that the environment that prescribes your
conduct and defines your career is wholly mental, the product of your
own selective attention, and that it is capable of such deliberate
molding and adjustment by you as will best promote your interests.
But the mere perception of sense-impressions, though a fundamental
part of our mental life, is by no means the whole of it. The mind is
also able to look at these perceptions, to assign them a meaning and
to reflect upon them. These operations constitute what are called the
Judicial Processes of the Mind.
The Judicial Processes of the Mind are of two kinds, so that, in the
last analysis, there are, in addition to sense-perceptions, two, and
only two, types of thought.
One of these types of thought is called a Causal Judgment and the
other a Classifying Judgment.