The Athenaeum. (Atlanta, GA) 1898-1925, January 01, 1925, Image 18
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THE ATHENAEUM
When the child has reached a reasonable age the mother will say
"doll” whenever she gives the child the doll. As long as the doll is
present whenever desired the child is not likly to attempt to use the
word doll. But when the doll is absent, the child having heard “doll”
several times at the same time that he saw the doll, will call out "doll”
If the doll is brought at his call the conditioned reaction is completed,
the word "doll” being substituted for the doll will now arouse the
same response. In a similar manner the mother says "open box”
when the box is opened by the child, "close box” when box is closed,
"put blocks in box” as the child performs that operation, and thus
word habits are put on the conditional reflex level. This is later sup
plemented but not superceded by the formation of words on the inte
grated and associated level.
The membranous glottis together with the vocal cords is the ex
clusive seat of voice production. The laryx controls the pitch of the
voice. The chest cavity and the throat and mouth cavities act as
resonators. In speaking the diaphram, lungs and muscles of the
larynx, nose, and palate; the cheeks, tongue, and lips and the nerves
serving these part are all brought 1 into play. It is found by experi
ment that these parts also participate in subvocal behavior or think
ing.
Of course deaf and dumb people use the muscles of their fingers
(toes if these are repressed) in thinking. During infancy organiza
tions are put on without verbal parallels and this is the case also in
the main in the emotional field. But here thinking is done through
the nerves, muscles, and viscera which perform these organizations
and are substitutable for word organizations.
In general however a word habit is put on with each manual
habit. The verbal and manual habits are put on simultaneously. As
we learn to play tennis we begin to talk tennis. We control, initiate,
correct, and moditfy our manual habits verbally, either vocally or sub-
vocally. Thus it is clear that the verbal is an actual functioning part
of every act of skill and the word organization becomes dominant.
That we use the same mechanism of nerves and throat muscles
in thinking or implicit language as in explicit language has been de
monstrated experimentally by the tracing on a smoked drum- A
subject was commanded to repeat a sentence overtly and then to go
over the sentence implicityly. The same tracing was noted on the
smoked drum in both cases.
Thinking then, whether it be the unwinding of a vocal habit of
the routine type with invariable word sequence, the solving of pro
blems with acquired formulas in the trial type, or the solution of
entirely new problems—the facing up to sudden situations with trial
and error behavior, is an integrated bodily process carried on through
neuro-muscular activity. It is a constituent part of every adjustment
and its general method is by trial and error. The thinking adjustment
is achieved when the final word grouping or bodily reactibn makes
the initial stimulus inoperative or inert.