Series No. VII.—The object of this series was to determine the effect in ideation of exposing for unequal lengths of time the two objects compared. The figures compared were of the same area and outline, and were distinguished only by their color, one being red and the other green. These colors were employed, after a preliminary test, as showing, on the whole, to nearly equal advantage in the individual choice of colors. The shorter exposure was five seconds and the longer exposure ten seconds. The color that was to be seen the longer time was exposed first alone; after five seconds the other was exposed; and then both were seen for five seconds together, so that neither might have the advantage of the more recent impression. The two colors were regularly alternated, and in one half of the series the longer exposure was to the right, in the other half to the left. The extra five seconds were thus in each case at the beginning of the experiment.
The general averages show only a slight advantage in favor of the color which was exposed the longer time, namely, 29.15 seconds, as against 27.75 seconds. It is not easy to believe that the advantage of sole occupancy of the visual field for five seconds, without any offsetting disadvantage in the next five seconds, should have so slight an effect on the course of ideation. And it is not improbable that there was an offsetting disadvantage. In the presence of color the subject can scarcely remain in the attitude of quiet curiosity which it is easy to maintain in the observation of colorless objects. A positive interest is excited. And the appearance of a new color in the field when there is another color there already seems to be capable of exciting, by a sort of successive contrast different from that ordinarily described, an interest which is the stronger from the fact that the subject has already been interested in a different color. That is to say, the transition from color to color (only red and green were employed) seems to be more impressive than the transition from black to color. And, under the conditions of the experiment, the advantage of this more impressive transition lay always with the color which was exposed the shorter time.
Judging from the introspective notes, the outline seems to suffer, in competition with a colored content, some loss of power to carry the attention and maintain its place in the ideation. "The colors tend to diffuse themselves, ignoring the boundary," says one. "The images fade from the periphery toward the center," says another. On the other hand, one of the subjects finds that when both images are present the color tends to fade out. This may perhaps be explained by the remark of another subject to the effect that there is an alternate shifting of the attention when both images are present. An attitude of continued and definite change, we may suppose, is one in which the color interest must yield to the interest in boundaries and definite spatial relations.
Other interesting facts come out in the notes. One subject finds the ideated plane farther away than the objective plane; another conceives the two as coinciding. The movement of the eyes is by this time distinctly perceived by the subject. The reports run as follows: 'Eye-movements seem to follow the changes in ideation;' 'I find my eyes already directed, when an image is ideated, to the corresponding side, and am sometimes conscious of the movement, but the movement is not intended or willed;' 'in ideating any particular color I find my attention almost always directed to the side on which the corresponding object was seen.' This last observation seems to be true for the experience of every subject, and, generally speaking, the images occupy the same relative positions as the objects: the image of the right object is seen to the right, that of the left object to the left, and the space between the two remains tolerably constant, especially for the full-faced figures.
This fact suggested a means of eliminating the disturbing influence of color, and its contrasts and surprises, by the substitution of gray figures identical in form and size and distinguished only by their spatial position. The result appears in the table which follows (VIII.).
Series No. VIII.—The object of this experiment was the same as that of No. VII. Granite-gray figures, however, were substituted, for the reasons already assigned, in place of the red and green figures. And here the effect of additional time in the exposure is distinctly marked, the general averages showing 32.12 seconds for the image of the object which was exposed 10 seconds, as against 25.42 seconds for the other.
TABLE VIII.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | Indiv. Aver. | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | 10 | 5 | 10 | 5 | 10 | 5 | 10 | 5 | 10 | 5 | 10 | |
| I. | 26.5 | 27 | 24.5 | 30.5 | 26.5 | 28 | 27.5 | 27.5 | 26.5 | 29 | 26.3 | 28.4 |
| II. | 32.5 | 38.5 | 27 | 36 | 29 | 28 | 17 | 14.5 | 37.5 | 27 | 28.6 | 28.8 |
| III. | 04.5 | 13.5 | 11 | 01.5 | 10 | 11 | 7.5 | 14.5 | 12.5 | 8.5 | 9.1 | 9.8 |
| IV. | 23.5 | 40.5 | 27.5 | 34 | 35.5 | 38 | 35 | 28 | 17 | 39 | 27.7 | 35.9 |
| V. | 41 | 46 | 50 | 51.5 | 43 | 42.5 | 46 | 35.5 | 31.5 | 44 | 42.3 | 43.9 |
| VI. | 07.5 | 27 | 18 | 25 | 21.5 | 25.5 | 07 | 44.5 | 33.5 | 19 | 17.5 | 28.2 |
| VIII. | 24.5 | 27 | 34.5 | 32 | 36.5 | 36 | 34.5 | 38.5 | 28 | 28.5 | 31.6 | 32.4 |
| IX. | 17 | 46 | 25.5 | 47.5 | 44 | 47 | 40.5 | 47.5 | 48 | 48 | 35.0 | 47.2 |
| X. | 20 | 29 | 21 | 26.5 | 25.5 | 24.5 | 27.5 | 22 | 19.5 | 23.5 | 22.7 | 25.1 |
| XI. | 11 | 41.5 | 09.5 | 50 | 05.5 | 43.5 | 15.5 | 40.5 | 25.5 | 32 | 13.4 | 41.5 |
| 20.80 | 33.60 | 24.85 | 33.45 | 27.70 | 32.40 | 25.80 | 31.30 | 27.95 | 29.85 | 25.42 | 32.12 | |
VII.—Absent.
5: refers to object exposed 5 seconds. 10: refers to object exposed 10 seconds.