ascribe general validity to these results, at least for my own case.
Note.—There is in the tests an inner inequality which I can neither avoid, nor remove by correction, but can only point out. It is that a small number of repetitions of the series requires only a few minutes, and consequently come at a time of unusual mental vitality. With 64 repetitions the whole work takes about ¾ of an hour; the great part of the series is, therefore, studied in a condition of diminished vigor or even of a certain exhaustion, and the repetitions will, consequently, be less effective. It is just the reverse of this in the reproduction of the series the next day. The series impressed by 8 perusals require three times as much time in order to be memorised as those perused 64 times. Consequently the latter will be learned a little more quickly not only on account of their greater fixedness, but also because they are now studied for the most part under better conditions. These irregularities are mutually opposed, as is evident, and therefore partially compensate each other: the series prepared under comparatively unfavorable conditions are memorised under comparatively more favorable conditions, and vice versa. I cannot tell, however, how far this compensation goes and how far any remaining inequality of conditions disturbs the results.
Section 24. The Influence of Recollection
One factor in the regular course of the results obtained seems to deserve special attention. In ordinary life it is of the greatest importance, as far as the form which memory assumes is concerned, whether the reproductions occur with accompanying recollection or not,—i.e., whether the recurring ideas simply return or whether a knowledge of their former existence and circumstances comes back with them. For, in this second case, they obtain a higher and special value for our practical aims and for the manifestations of higher mental life. The question now is, what connection is there between the inner life of these ideas and the complicated phenomena of recollection which sometimes do and sometimes do not accompany the appearance in consciousness of images? Our results contribute somewhat toward the answer to this question.
When the series were repeated 8 or 16 times they had become unfamiliar to me by the next day. Of course, indirectly, I knew quite well that they must be the same as the ones studied the day before, but I knew this only indirectly. I did not get it from the series, I did not recognise them. But with 53 or 64 repetitions I soon, if not immediately, treated them as old acquaintances, I remembered them distinctly. Nothing corresponding to this difference is evident in the times for memorisation and for savings of work respectively. They are not smaller relatively
