Tridimensional theory of feeling. Full text of "The Tridimensional Theory of Feeling" 2022-10-21

The Tridimensional Theory of Feeling

The feeling of c-e-g is a tenfold complex. Storring's observers, on the other hand, report a qualitative difference between Stimmungslust and Empfindungs- lust; but though this is, so to say, a gross difference, the ex- pressions used are singularly disappointing. It would, I think, be a very strange thing if three sets of stimuli should affect a number of observers by way of excitement-depression or tension-relaxation precisely as they do by way of pleasantness-unpleasantness, — but nobody can prove that such a state of affairs is, on the plural theory, impossible. Grant everything that the most ardent disciples of the method de- mand, and then ask yourselves: where is the evidence, in these 2 1 8 TITCHBNER correlations, that we are dealing with elementary mental pro- cesses? To understand new psychology better, let's look at the history of the movement and one of its founders, Wilhelm Wundt. The works date from the mid-seventeenth to the early twentieth centuries. People may post this content online or redistribute in any way for non-commercial purposes. If, then, I am to judge others by myself, this uncertainty in the meaning of terms may be at least a partial reason for the fact that Wundt's classification, despite its claim to finality, does not always command the assent even of those who agree with its spirit and intention.

Human Intelligence: Wilhelm Wundt

My idea was, on the subjective side, to test by their means the immediacy of reaction in these dimensions. One way of doing this is through apperception, or the way a person uses his or her previous knowledge and experience to understand what he or she is perceiving. Now your compound feeling should be a THE TRIDIMENSIONAL THEORY OF FEELING 227 fourfold complex. On the subjective side, again, there is the appeal to the introspection of the observers. Known as the Early Journal Content, this set of works include research articles, news, letters, and other writings published in more than 200 of the oldest leading academic journals.

Full text of "The Tridimensional Theory of Feeling"

If we wish to analyze them, we must have recourse to the sort of psychophysical analysis that we employ, e. Introspection has a lot of technical issues and is not used very much today. Qualitative analysis then reveals certain fundamental types of emotion, which must, of course, be preformed in the affective qualities. That, then, was Wundt's doctrine, taken at the purely de- scriptive level: sensations with an immanent attribute of pleasantness-unpleasantness, the original simplicity of which appears clearly enough in the lower sense-departments, but in the higher is obscured by aesthetic or quasi-sesthetic reference. The first of these arguments I take to be sound, both formally and materially, though I do not arrive by it at the conclusion which Wundt has reached.

New Psychology: Definition, History & Wilhelm Wundt

People may post this content online or redistribute in any way for non--commercial purposes. His tridimensional theory of feelings says that all feelings fall somewhere on three scales: excitement-calm, pleasure-displeasure, and tension-relaxation. . Sometimes Wundt says Hemmung, sometimes he says Beruhigung, some- times Depression. And while sensa- tions fall into a number of separate systems, there is but one affective system : tone and color, warmth and pressure are disparate, but "alle einfachen Gefiihle bilden eine einzige zusamtnenhangende Mannigfaltigkeit, insofern es kein Geftihl gibt, von dem aus man nicht durch Zwischenstufen und Indif- ferenzzonen zu irgend einem andern Gefiihle gelangen konnte. This problem, too, can be solved; but it is foreign to our present consideration.

The Tridimensional Theory of Feeling from the Standpoint of Typical Experiences

He explains a that a triple classification of the affective elements is required for the distinction of the funda- mental types of emotion. And it must be remembered that Wundt does not acknowledge any other methods than those employed by the dualists, and would not acquiesce in the statement that his results are of another order. Wundt identifies Strebungsge- fuhl with Thatigkeitsgfuhl, and makes it a total feeling, com- pounded of strain and excitement. The introspective task is extremely simple; the observer has merely to be passive, to let himself go, to allow the stimuli to take affective possession of him ; and then to indicate, in the particular instance, which of the two makes the stronger impression. JSTOR is a digital library of academic journals, books, and primary source objects. Remember how we said that mental systems are hierarchical? He comes within our universe of discourse; he invites argument.

a sense organ Wundt believed that feelings have three dimensions his

I believe that Wundt would have formulated his new affective theory in -any event; the theory was implicit in him and in his previous writings. Or if you're asked a question, how long does it take you to come up with a response? Wundt replies, in the Bemerkungen, that he has left spatial ideas out of account for two reasons: first, "weil sich mir Beziehungen derselben zu bestimmten Gefiihlsrichtungen weder in der unmittelbaren subjectiven Beobachtung noch bei der Analyse der Ausdrucksbewegungen darboten ; ' ' and secondly, "weil es mir scheint, dass man sehr wohl bei jedem Affect qualitative, intensive und zeitliche Eigenschaften unter- scheiden kann, wahrend ich mit dem Ausdruck, der Zorn oder die Freude habe irgend eine raumliche Ausdehnung, keinen rechten Sinn zu verbinden weiss. I acquitted Wundt, just now, of the charge of circularity; I am afraid that I must here charge him with the logical error which is known in the ver- nacular as 'missing the point. But there is a difference. Even in the Grundriss, however, Wundt is not simply dog- matic. Feeling is a third attribute of most of these, and represents their subjective aspect. These intensive ideas are therefore responsible for two affective dimensions, the intensive and qualitative ; the temporal ideas are responsible for a third dimension, the tem- poral ; only the spatial ideas are excused from affective duty.

For example, think about how you might feel if you've just completed a masterpiece painting. We encourage people to read and share the Early Journal Content openly and to tell others that this resource exists. Wir nennen diesen dritten Bestandtheil der Empfindung den Gefuhlston oder das sinnliche Gefuhl. Likewise, you can use your previous understanding about painting to help you assess your own painting. The other two, e and g, will do the same, — though the affective qualities will be some- what different.

We should then have something like Royce's classification: pleasantness-unpleasantness, con- ditioned upon all the 'qualitative' attributes of sensation, and excitement-quiescence conditioned upon all the 'intensive. The work is laborious, and the method consumes a large amount of time. The results of the first investigation, in which colors and musical tones were tested for pleasantness-unpleasantness and excitement-depression, and metronome intervals for pleasant- ness-unpleasantness and tension-relaxation, were published in the Wundt Festschrift; those of the second, in which the same tones and intervals were tested for all three of the Wundtian dimensions, were published by Hayes in the American Journal of Psychology. Pleasure and pain in the form of desire and repulsion govern all volition. But I believe, also, that organic sensations are responsible in certain cases for a Nuancirung, a shading and coloring, of feel- ings in the dimension of pleasant-unpleasantness.

I readily acknowledge, again, that these minor inconsistencies are in no sense fatal to the theory; indeed, Wundt has so often emphasised the importance for feeling of the "ganze Disposition des Bewusstseins" that I feel reluctant, as it were a morsel ashamed, to dwell upon them. In the present instance, that external cause appears, very obviously, in the publication of Kiilpe's Grundriss. Moreover, since the in- trospective experience within a series is cumulative, all of the same kind, the observer is able, in the intervals between suc- cessive series, to give a general account of his method of judgment, of the nature of his affective reaction. . Feeling thus depends on the general subjective disposition in a way which is not true of quality and intensity.

And the same un- certainty characterises certain of his observations in detail. Had Wundt stopped short at the point which we have now reached; had he stated his theory, shown its usefulness in systematic regard for the classification of emo- tions, and indicated the correlated differences in the pulse- tracings: his position would, I think, have been stronger than it actually is. If my reading of Wundt is correct, the changes that he has made from time to time in his various systematic works have never been due, in any real way, to external causes, but have always represented the climax or culmination of a stage of in- ternal development. Orth cannot find it, in the introspections that he educes by the Reizmethode. Bentley: American Journal of Psychology, XIV, 19o3, 92 ff. On the other hand, it is possi- ble, at least in most cases, to point with a fair degree of prob- ability to the external cause that brought these obscure ideas to the attentive focus. Like those other theories of attention and of space perception, it represents the culmination of an epoch of psychological thought; but, like them again, it is rather the starting point for further enquiry than the statement of assured psychological result.