EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY 



of each of these traits how much is original and how much 

 is acquired; it is necessary to take account of all of them as 

 persistent motives. 



There are certain types of fears which children are prone 

 to develop and definite ways in which the fear motif in 

 their lives can be reduced or directed. There are many 

 types of experience which tend to provoke anger; and in 

 some the anger response is to be encouraged, in others 

 discouraged. If curiosity in the form of natural childish 

 interests is neglected, the result is likely to be the imposi- 

 tion of educational subject matter and procedures which 

 run counter to child nature. Neglect of the deep-seated 

 desire for self-assertion and mastery brings about the form- 

 ation of inferiority complexes which may paralyze activity 

 or result in over-compensation in the form of conceit, 

 "touchiness," and boastful lying. Neglecting to take 

 account of gregariousness, suggestibility, and imitativeness 

 creates half the problems of school discipline, gives us 

 most of our juvenile delinquents, and renders ineffective 

 some of the best-intentioned efforts of moral education 

 as it is practiced. To ignore the appeal of play and make- 

 believe in the life of children would place us below the 

 most primitive savages in educational wisdom. As for the 

 pervading influence of sex, so much has been written on 

 this subject in recent years that its importance is now 

 generally recognized. It is possible here merely to call 

 attention to some of the X-Y traits which the educational 

 psychologist must take into account; to attempt to formu- 

 late desirable educational procedures in connection with 

 each would require a volume. 



Individual Differences and Their Causes. One of the most 

 important of the contributions to education which psy- 

 chology has made is in the field of individual differences. 

 The older psychology was concerned almost entirely with 

 the establishment of general truths concerning human 



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