13. Successive association is by no means a process that differs essentially from the two forms of simultaneous association, assimilation and complication. It is, on the contrary, due to the same general causes as these, and differs only in the secondary characteristic that the process of combination, [p. 236] which in the former cases consisted, so far as immediate introspection was concerned, of a single instantaneous act, is here protracted and may therefore be readily divided two acts. The first of these acts corresponds to the appeararof the reproducing elements, the second to the appearance the reproduced elements. Here too, the first act is often introduced by an external sense-impression, whicha rule immediately united with an assimilation. Other reproductive elements which might enter into an assimilation or complication are held back through some inhibitory influence or other -- as, for example, through other assimilations that force themselves earlier on apperception -- and do not begin to exercise an influence until later.
In this way have a second act of apperception clearly distinct from first, and differing from it in sensational content the more essentially the more numerous the new elements are added through the retarded assimilation and complication and the more these new elements tend to displace the earlier because of their different character.
14. In the great majority of cases the association formed is limited to two successive ideational or affective processes connected, in the manner described, through assimilations or complications. New sense-impressions or apperceptive combinations (§
17) may then connect themselves with the second member of the association.
Less frequently happens that the same processes which led to the first division of an assimilation or complication into a successive process, may be repeated with the second or even with the third member, so that in this way we have a whole associational series. Still, this takes place generally only under exceptional conditions, especially when the normal course of apperception has been disturbed, as, for example, in the so-called "flight of ideas" of the insane. In normal cases such as serial associations, that is, associations with more than two members, hardly ever appear.
14a. Such serial associations may be produced most easily under the artificial conditions of experimentation, when the effort is purposely made to suppress new sensible impressions and apperceptive combinations. But the process resulting in such cases differs from that described above in that the successive members of the series do not connect, each with its immediate predecessor, but all go back to the first, until a new sense-impression or an idea with an especially strong affective tone furnishes a new starting point for the succeeding associations. The associations-in the "flight of ideas" of the insane generally show the type of returning to certain predominant centres. a. Sensible Recognition and Cognition.
The way in which the ordinary form of association, made up of two partial processes, may be most clearly observed, is in the simultaneous assimilations and complications of sensible recognition and cognition. The qualification "sensible" is when referring to these associative processes, to indicate, on the one hand, that the first member of the pro-always a sense-impression, and, on the other, to distinguish these from the logical processes of cognition.
The psychologically simplest case of recognition is that an object has been perceived -- for example, seen - only once and is recognized as the same when met a second. If this second perception follows very soon after the first, or if the first was especially emphatic and exciting, the association usually takes place immediately as a simultaneous assimilation. This process differs from other assimilation, which take place in connection with every sense-perception, only in the characteristic accompanying feeling, of familiarity. Such a feeling is never present except when there is some degree of "consciousness" that the [p. 238] impression has already been received before. It is, therefore, evidently one of those feelings which comes from the ideas obscurely present in consciousness.
The psychological difference between this and an ordinary simultaneous assimilation must be looked for in the fact that at the moment when, in the apperception of the impression, the assimilation takes place, there arise in the obscure regions of consciousness some components of the original idea which do not enter into the assimilation. Their relation to the elements of the idea that is apperceived finds expression in the feeling of familiarity.
The unassimilated components may be elements of the earlier impression that were so different from certain elements of the new that they could not be assimilated, or, and this is especially often the case, they may be complications that were clear before, but now remain unobserved. This influence of complication explains how it is that the name of a visual object, for example the proper names of persons, and often other auditory qualities, such as the tone of voice, are very great helps in the recognition.
To serve as such helps, however, they need not necessarily be clear ideas in consciousness. When we, have heard a man's name, the recognition of the man the next time we meet him may be aided by the name without our calling it clearly to mind.