Herrick, Lecture Notes on Attention. 9 



E.xperiment. — Glance casually over a page of print and note whether some 

 phra.'^e or word catches the eye. (The experiment is much more conclusive when 

 done unintentionally). What word emerged? On repeating this experiment 

 and glancing casually down the columns of the "Times" the writer caught the 

 word "college" and "university" many times also the word "association " 

 several times and hardly another word. A house keeper looking at the page of 

 the "Youth's Companion" saw "cooking" and "sweeping" first. 



The experiment may be conducted under scientific control in various ways. 

 Arrange groups of figures similar in size and body of shade, most of them un- 

 familiar, one or more familiar, and reveal them for a short period (not too short), 

 or produce familiarity by exposing squares covered by some one or more of the 

 symbols as preparatory to the experiment. Note the effect of "association." 



The result of these experiments convinces that the selec- 

 tion of one out of many impressions to be placed in the favored 

 attitude in the sense organ is largely influenced by interest 

 and habit. The word " interest " is here used in a popular and 

 perhaps misleading sense. Probably in the sphere of the ex- 

 ternal sense these effects are all the result of habit. For exam- 

 ple, the reason that my eye caught the words "college," "uni- 

 versity," and "association" out of their places among others 

 was certainly not the superior interest which these words have 

 for me, for tliey emerged before there was any consciousness of 

 the interest. True, I had often associated in mind these very 

 words in interesting connections and had consciously gone about 

 to seek these words or passages containing them with the mind 

 "loaded," so to speak, for this particular game. The result is 

 a habit of selection which retains its unconscious power. The 

 number of cotemporaneous sensations received by any sense 

 is purely a matter of the structural adaptability of the organ or 

 its natural field. All of the impressions of a given field of 

 sense may become the content of that sense and so may exert 

 their appropriate effects in infra-conscious spheres of association, 

 etc., even though only part of them ever reach consciousness. 

 The discussion as to the possible number of cotemporaneous 

 sensations is based on a misconception. Though the content of 

 sense may be diversified only one thing is ever in the focus of 

 consciousness at a given time. 



So far we have been dealing with comparatively pure cases 

 of external attention, but it is not to be denied that the con- 



