Instinct and Personality

A. Campbell Garnett

• Editorial: Routledge
• Año: 2021
• ISBN:
  9780429582073
• Edición: 1
• Categoría: Psicología
• Categoría: Historia y teoría en psicología

Originally published in 1928, the principle aim of this book was to present and apply an original viewpoint in psychology. The work is substantially that of a thesis on "The Problem of Personality in the Light of Recent Psychology" for which the author was awarded the degree of Doctor of Letters in the University of Melbourne in 1925. Today it can be read and enjoyed in its historical context.

Chapter VIII

THE EXPLANATION OF THE UNCONSCIOUS

MEMORY may be considered as the process whereby past experience is registered, conserved and, in a certain sense, reproduced. Whether the medium in which the registration and conservation takes place is psychical or physical need not concern us here; they are parts of the total process which we simply assume in order to explain the experience of reproduction. The reproduction, it must be remembered, is not the same experience as the original. The memory of a burnt finger is, fortunately, something very different from the experience of burning it. It is a reproduction in somewhat the same sense as a picture of a landscape is a reproduction of the original mountains and trees. But even such reproductions of experience as we have in memory must depend upon the registration of that experience in some relatively permanent medium and upon the conservation of that registration. If any of the three processes should fail, then memory fails, for memory is a chain of processes every link in which must be intact if the end result is to be obtained.

For the study of the process of dissociation or repression it is important to distinguish between two kinds of forgetting or failure of memory. This has been clearly pointed out by T. H. Pear in a contribution to a symposium on “The Role of Repression in Forgetting” published in the British Journal of Psychology for September 1914. The first is a forgetting due to a failure in “conservation,” which may in turn be due to an inadequate “registration.” This is the gradual fading from the mind of things once known, and is due, it will be almost universally agreed, to the plasticity, and therefore limited retentivity, of the brain as the organ of mind. This, however, is not the kind of forgetting which constitutes the problem before us. The second type may be illustrated by the forgetting of the name of a person or place familiar enough to us. It is a more or less temporary forgetting. The experience has been adequately registered and fully conserved, for it comes back to us clearly on some later occasion, it is a failure of the process of “reproduction.”

Even in cases of this second class we may distinguish between two further types of forgetting. Some things are forgotten for the time, but a little effort of attention in thinking round them will bring them back, or they return to us spontaneously at some later time. Others can only be recalled by some special method such as hypnosis, automatic writing, or the “free association” method of psychoanalysis. Once recalled in this way, the second class may be as clear and convincing as the first. This latter distinction is only one of convenience. There is probably no fundamental distinction between these two types of the second kind of forgetting ; the only difference is in the difficulty of reproduction. It is this failure to reproduce that which has been adequately registered and is still conserved which constitutes the fact of dissociation or repression.

Of these two terms, “dissociation” and “repression,” which we have hitherto used synonymously, the former is to be preferred. The term “repression” is too loosely used. It is used of the deliberate effort to keep certain ideas out of one’s mind, of the inhibition of impulses and desires, and of the curbing of the natural impulses of an individual by a second party. It also carries with it too strong a suggestion of a metaphorical description of the unconscious which is apt to be misleading—the metaphor of “the conscious” and “the unconscious” as the upper and lower stories of the mind. The term “dissociation.” much more neatly describes the facts. Experiences are recalled by a process of association. If they are conserved but cannot be recalled, it is because they are “dissociated” Some writers, notably Rivers and McDougall, have given to the term other, narrower connotations. But the word seems to us to be too valuable to be thus confined.

We have already seen ample evidence of this process of dissociation in the facts of unconscious process and in the censorship of dreams. We have next to ask the reason of it. Freud’s theory is that it is always the painful elements of experience that are thus dissociated, and he believes that they are cut off from experience for no other reason than that they are painful. He has written a whole volume¹ to show that when any name, word, etc., is thus temporarily forgotten it is always because of some painful associations to it. Ernest Jones formulates the Freudian theory as follows:

“There exist in the mind certain inhibiting forces which tend to exclude from consciousness all mental processes the presence of which would evoke there, either directly or through association, a feeling of ‘unpleasantness’ (Unlust). It is, of course, evident that the efficacy of such forces is at best a relative one, for otherwise consciousness would never experience ‘unpleasantness’; but the thesis is maintained that, whenever this experience occurs it is only because the action of the forces in question has first been neutralized by other tendencies and motives in the mind, whether volitional or not.”²

“The main fact that this [Freud’s] theory sets out to explain is that it is more difficult to recall an unpleasant memory than a pleasant one, other things being equal. The fact itself is, I think, beyond dispute, and has not been questioned by anyone who has seriously investigated the phenomenon either experimentally or clinically. According to the repression [what we have called “dissociation”] theory, the reason why it is more difficult to recall an unpleasant memory is because it is kept back from entering consciousness by the action of certain inhibiting, ‘repressing’ forces, the function of which is to guard consciousness, so far as possible, from the pain of disagreeable affects.”¹

This theory of dissociation is, I believe, altogether too simple. If it were true, its biological effect would be disastrous. It is even more important to man that he should remember his painful experiences than his pleasant ones. The instinctive reactions of animals are largely modified by their memories of painful experiences. Whether they are more readily modified by pleasurable than by painful experience it is not possible to discover, on account of the impossibility of equating the strength of the two stimuli. It may be true, as Hingley says, that “we learn more by succeeding than by failing”;² but in the learning of what not to do it is on our painful experience (or other people’s) that we depend.

We need not, however, depend on the biological argument as to the utility of pain to show that this portion of the Freudian doctrine is unacceptable. It has recently been very thoroughly tested experimentally. The question is whether, as Ernest Jones says, “It is more difficult to recall an unpleasant memory than a pleasant one.” Dr. A. Wohlgemuth, in his Critical ‘Examination of Psychoanalysis,³ discusses in some detail a number of experiments, including some of his own, which have been made to test this question. We will endeavour to summarize the most important of these.

Kowaleski made 105 boys write down all the pleasant and all the unpleasant experiences of the previous day, a holiday. Ten days later they were told to write them again. The thirty-seven boys of the youngest group remembered $1\frac{1}{2}$ per cent, more of the unpleasant than the pleasant. The fifty-two boys of the middle group remembered 7 per cent, more unpleasant than pleasant. The sixteen boys of the oldest group remembered 5 per cent, more pleasant than unpleasant.

In a similar experiment carried out by himself, with the co-operation of school-teachers, with 687 children between the ages of eleven and sixteen years, Wohlgemuth obtained the following results:

(a) The whole of the results pooled.

Pleasant experiences recorded in first paper: 6,735.

Pleasant experiences forgotten in second paper: 2,700 = 40·1 per cent.

Unpleasant experiences recorded in first paper: 3,491.

Unpleasant experiences forgotten in second paper: 1,406 = 39·8 per cent.

(b) The percentage worked out for each child separately gave:

An average for pleasant experiences forgotton of 38·2.

An average for unpleasant experiences forgotten of 35·3.

A mean for pleasant experiences forgotten of 37·5 ; and a mean for unpleasant experiences forgotten of 33·3.

(c) The number of children who forgot—

a larger percentage of pleasant experiences was 345;

a larger percentage of unpleasant experiences was 280 ;

an equal percentage of both experiences was 62.

These results seem to show that there is no such general tendency, as psychoanalysts have assumed, to forget the unpleasant. The pleasantness or unpleasantness of an experience probably has nothing whatever to do with our remembering it except that both may serve to rivet attention upon it and thus register it more firmly. Mere hedonic tone, however, has no effect upon readiness of reproduction. This is in complete accord with the view of the ordinary man, who always meets with incredulity the assertion of the “new” psychologist that we all tend to forget most easily our painful experiences. It is contradicted by his everyday experience. If it be asked how we may account for the enormous number of instances accumulated by Freud and others, of forgotten names, words, duties, articles, occurrences, etc., which have been found, on analysis, to have unpleasant associations, the answer is that unpleasant associations can be found equally readily, by the same method of free association, to any other name, word, duty, etc. We have only to let our minds wander a little time to find some association quite unpleasant enough to convince a Freudian that it is the reason of our forgetting.

Since we cannot explain dissociation by the mere fact that dissociated experiences are uniformly found to be unpleasant, we must cast around for some other solution of the problem. This, I believe, we can find in long-recognized facts of the despised traditional psychology. The first of these is the fact that the field of consciousness is not all equally distinct. Attention comes to a more or less complete focus upon certain objects in that field. Of the rest we are only dimly conscious. Stimuli may awaken this marginal consciousness without eliciting consciousness of a definite object as, e.g., does the striking of a clock when one is absorbed in reading. Yet the strokes are not altogether unheard, for if someone, a few minutes later, asks the time we may have a fairly definite impression that it is, say, three o’clock, even though we have no recollection of having heard the clock strike. The second fact is that of the selective activity of attention within this field of consciousness under the impulsion of certain dominant interests, moods, and habits of thought. Some things will surely be noticed (come under the focus of attention) every time they come anywhere within the field of consciousness. Others will as surely be passed over.

The older psychology made the mistake of thinking that the passing over, by attention, of an object within the field of consciousness is always due to comparative lack of interest. The new psychology, led by Freud, assumes that it is because these objects are painful. Neither explanation fits the facts, for we have seen from the cases of dissociation already studied that memories of absorbing interest are thus shut out of consciousness, while painful memories are as readily reproduced as pleasant ones.

The explanation of dissociation probably lies in the fact that the dominant interest of the moment tends to absorb attention; not merely in that other things are excluded for lack of room, but also in that things contrary to that interest are specially guarded against. It is not true of consciousness as a whole that it possesses a censor which shuts out from it everything painful to it. But it is true of every particular interest which for the time may dominate consciousness that it works in a manner somewhat analogous to Freud’s censor; it tends to direct attention away from everything that is contrary to it. Things forgotten in this way are, of course, painful, but it is not merely because they are painful that they are forgotten. They are forgotten because the dominant interest of the moment directs the mind solely to things in harmony with it. It is notorious that people fail to recollect facts that are out of harmony with their argument or to see the significance of them if they are brought under their notice. A dominant life interest may send a man through life blind to one side of the world. Not only so, but two very strong, but opposing, interests may divide a man’s life between them and never be allowed to come into conflict, because never thought of together. They form what have been called “logic-tight” and “emotion-tight” departments of his mind. For his private life and family relationships a man may accept the ethical teachings of Christianity and be splendidly influenced by them. But in his business relationships he may be a different man, entirely forgetting them and uninfluenced by them in any way. Yet he may never realize his inconsistency. Whichever interest for the time occupies his thoughts directs attention only to those ideas which are in harmony with it and shuts out all others. The result is that the two contradictory sets of sentiments and beliefs, which are effective each in different spheres of his life, never enter clear consciousness together, and the contradiction is never clearly seen. In a similar way a Socialist may, without realizing his inconsistency, preach liberty, equality and fraternity at every union meeting and every Sunday afternoon demonstration and yet allow no liberty of opinion among his fellows and no equality in his home, and practise no fraternity that ever requires any sacrifice.

In the numerous cases of forgetting quoted by those who accept the Freudian view of the effect of pain on memory, wherever the painfulness of the forgotten circumstance or its associations is clearly demonstrable it will be found to be of this type—painful because opposed to the dominant interest of the moment. Freud’s illustrations in the Psychopathology of “Everyday Life are not the best for the purpose of demonstrating this, for they are chosen with a view to demonstrating the effect of unconscious complexes upon the workings of consciousness, and the connection is therefore usually uncertain and far-fetched. We will take instead the interesting examples given by R. H. Hingley, a careful observer and clear-sighted exponent of psychoanalytic doctrine. The first is one quoted from Ernest Jones :

“An instance, which is hard to credit, though I can vouch for the accuracy of it, was related to me by a medical friend. His wife was seriously ill with some obscure abdominal malady, which might well have been tubercular, and, while anxiously pondering over the possible nature of it, he remarked to her: ‘It is comforting to think that there has been no tuberculosis in your family.’ She turned to him very astonished, and said: ‘Have you forgotten that my mother died of tuberculosis, and that my sister recovered from it only after having been given up by the doctors ?’ His anxiety lest the obscure symptoms should prove to be tubercular had made him forget a piece of knowledge that was thoroughly familiar to him.”¹

Obviously, the husband’s dominant interest was not so much to discover the nature of the malady as to prove that it was nothing serious. This interest, therefore, completely passed over the significant circumstance of the disease in the family. It was not in the interest of the interest (if we may be permitted a pun) to remember it. A similar example of overlooking an important fact in diagnosing an illness Hingley records from his personal experience:

“A few months ago my baby boy showed signs of digestive disorders. As these continued for some time, my wife and I discussed carefully all the changes that we could remember having taken place in his dietary about the time of the onset of the trouble. Finding nothing that could account for it, we set it down to some change in the quality of the milk he was getting. But as the trouble showed no signs of improving, the doctor was called in. He was unable to suggest the cause until just as he was about to leave it occurred to my wife to mention that she had been giving the child rusks to eat. At once it was suspected that he had been swallowing these without proper mastication, and subsequent events proved this. But why did it not occur to either of us to mention the rusks when we were considering the details of his food ? The answer to that question, we both recognized, was that we were pleased to think that he was now able to eat solid food, and it was much easier to give him a rusk than to prepare his liquid refreshment.”¹

Apparently, so long as the malady was not serious, it was felt by both parents as a personal inconvenience more than anything else, and the interest lying behind the effort to discover the source of the trouble was mainly the desire to overcome a source of inconvenience. That interest, therefore, never directed attention to those very convenient rusks. It was not until, the doctor having failed to diagnose the trouble, the mother became really concerned for the child that attention was directed to the item overlooked when the other interest was dominant. We pass on to the next example:

“For some time I have been running over my recent experiences to find some further material to illustrate this chapter [on “The Psychopathology of Everyday Life”]. I could think of nothing suitable, but all the time there is one incident which I might have been expected to recall at once. Only a week or two ago I left a bag of valuable books and a parcel of my wife’s on the platform of a certain railway-station. But why did this incident, which caused me considerable concern at the time, elude me when I was looking for such instances ? The reader may have the facts and draw his own conclusion. After the event, being interested in the causes of forgetting, several times I have asked myself, Why did I forget that bag ? But I could discover no reason. The incident apparently did not fit in with the theor...

Índice

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Preface
• Table of Contents
• I. The Urge of Life
• II. The Nature of Instinct
• III. Expectation
• IV. The Sources of Energy
• V. The Native Human Motives
• VI. The Ideals
• VII. The Facts of Unconscious Process
• VIII. The Explanation of the Unconscious
• IX. Body and Mind
• Index