548 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 744 



Lectures on the Elementary Psychology of 

 Feeling and Attention. By Edward Brad- 

 ford TiTCHENER. Pp. X + 404. New York, 

 The Macmillan Co. 1908. 

 This volume contains eight lectures given 

 while the author was non-resident lecturer in 

 psychology at Columbia University in 1908. 

 As the title implies, they give a resume and 

 critical discussion of the recent work and cur- 

 rent theories of psychology on the two topics 

 mentioned. 



The first chapter contains a discussion of 

 sensation and its attributes. The attributes 

 are broadened beyond current usage to seven. 

 They are divided into two groups. The in- 

 tensive, in which are grouped the familiar 

 intensity, duration and extent together with 

 clearness; the qualitative attributes, that for 

 sight would include hue, tint and chroma. 

 Differences in kind of sensation depend upon 

 distinguishable differences in the qualitative 

 attributes; differences in degree upon differ- 

 ences in the quantitative attributes. 



Chapter II. is devoted to a consideration of 

 the criteria that distinguish affection from 

 sensation. It is often asserted that feelings 

 and sensations are different in that we be- 

 come habituated to feelings not to sensations, 

 that feelings are centrally relatively more in- 

 tense, that feelings are subjective, sensations 

 objective; the one is non^localizable, the other 

 localizable; that feelings exhibit antagonism 

 in quality and are unclear, while sensation 

 qualities are not necessarily opposed and are 

 or may be clear. The first two of these cri- 

 teria are rejected absolutely, the next two are 

 held to be doubtful, while the last two alone 

 are retained. 



Chapter III. discusses Stumpfs doctrine of 

 feeling as a special kind of sensation, sense 

 feeling. The doctrine is rejected as out of 

 harmony with introspective results and sup- 

 ported by rather uncertain psycho-physical 

 evidence. The fourth chapter is devoted to 

 Wundt's tridimensional classification of the 

 feelings with the same negative result. 



The fifth chapter begins the discussion of 

 attention with a discussion of the nature and 



conditions of clearness. Clearness and at- 

 tention are identified. The conditions of 

 clearness are found ultimately in the nervoiis 

 disposition, the predisposition of the central 

 nervous system and sense organs. The sixth 

 and seventh lectures are devoted to the laws 

 of attention. The first asserts that clearness 

 is an independent attribute of sensation; the 

 second that there are always two levels of 

 clearness to be distinguished, although the 

 rigidity of the distinction is softened by the 

 statement that there are minor differences of 

 clearness within each level. The third law is 

 that the peripheral and central adaptation 

 requires time and that as a result (4) there 

 are temporal displacements since these ac- 

 commodations bring earliest to conscious- 

 ness the stimulus to which the organism is 

 adapted. The object of attention is always 

 a unitary field within which several part con- 

 tents may be distinguished. The fluctuations 

 of attention are referred to the periphery. 

 There is finally the hope expressed that it 

 may be possible some day to determine the 

 law of the degree of clearness, but the most 

 that can be done at present is to discuss the 

 various methods that have been suggested for 

 the measurement of attention. 



In the final chapter affections would be 

 identified with the unclear elements of con- 

 sciousness; their sense organs have not yet 

 become fully differentiated. Attention and 

 feeling are positively related. We can attend 

 without feeling, but can not feel without at- 

 tending. Attention increases the effective- 

 ness of feelings as it does of sensations. 

 Attention is characterized in addition to clear- 

 ness by its relation to will in the Wundtian 

 sense. Passive and active and secondary 

 passive are retained as real distinctions and 

 supported on genetic grounds. The final 

 theory of attention is in close agreement with 

 Wundt. 



These are the outlines of the book, but a 

 summary can give no idea of the painstaking 

 care with which the sources have been gone 

 through, nor of the scrupulous endeavor to 

 give every man and every theory its due. 

 There is a refreshing absence of anything 

 that even approaches dogma, and the greatest 



