The New Student's Reference Work/Apperception
Apperception. This term was originally used by Leibniz (1646-1716), a German philosopher. He wished to distinguish between consciousness and self-consciousness. Ordinary perception makes us aware of external objects, but not of our own perceptions as distinct from what we perceive. Leibniz employed the word apperception to indicate the consciousness of perception. This self-consciousness, he thought, is not possessed by the lower animals, but only by human beings. The brute perceives, man apperceives, or perceives that he perceives. The philosopher Kant (1724-1804) used the term apperception to mean the power of the mind to relate to various perceptions and especially to organize them into a system. The result of apperception, according to him, is that the objects of perception are all seen to belong to one world, to be governed by its laws and thus to be related to each other, and all the perceptions are seen to belong to various minds, by which they are organized, and by the laws of which they are controlled.
Herbart (1776-1841), another German philosopher and psychologist, still further modified the definition of apperception by conceiving it to be the process by which old experience assimilates or gives meaning to new perceptions. This view emphasizes the fact that the character of one's previous experience will determine whether he will be interested in any new object sufficiently to attend to it, that is, to apperceive it. Moreover, the new object that one attends to will seem significant and interesting in accordance with the richness of the experience that he has already acquired in reference to similar objects. Indeed, different people may apperceive the same thing in very different ways and yet all find it interesting. To illustrate these points, suppose a person in crossing a stream sees what looks like a small dull, yellow stone. It does not differ much from the other stones surrounding it, and if the observer does not know enough about that sort of an object to make it more interesting to him than its neighbors, it will not arrest his attention. Suppose, however, that the observer is a savage, who has noticed such stones before, and that they are unusually heavy, and therefore valuable as missiles, such a person would get from seeing the stone a number of suggestions connected with warfare or the hunting of wild animals, and be sufficiently interested to pick it up and carry it away. But if a civilized man were to perceive that the object is not an ordinary stone, but a nugget of gold, his interest will become intense because of his knowledge of its use as money and in the arts. He will not only pick up the nugget, but will do so eagerly. A great number of ideas will surge into his mind, and it may be some time before he will think of anything except his discovery and its significance. Moreover, his actions will be very extensively modified by the experience. If he happens to be a miner, he may perceive in the nugget the suggestion of a rich deposit of gold in the neighborhood, and the current of his life may be turned by its discovery.
It is evident that apperception means alike to Leibniz, Kant and Herbart the interpreting of perceptions by the mind. Leibniz saw in this a process of reflecting upon and becoming conscious of our perceptions. This is, no doubt, one phase of the process of apperception. Kant noticed that this interpreting of perceptions consists in relating and organizing them, and here, too, is an important part of the truth. Herbart brought out the fact that the relating of experience consists in the suggesting of old experience by new perceptions and that its organization means the interpretation of the new perception by the knowledge thus called up. The active force in apperception is, with Herbart, experience itself, and not, as with Kant, a mind that is thought to organize experiences which are themselves passive.
The consequences on education of this view of Herbart are very important. Learning, i. e., apperception, is commonly regarded as absorbing new facts and organizing them so that they may be useful. According to Kant, the teacher might be supposed to present the facts, but their organization must be left to the activity and inclination or will of the pupil. The Herbartian notion of apperception, on the other hand, makes the teacher responsible in a measure for the activity displayed by the learner in assimilating or interpreting the new experience. For the successful apperception of a new object depends upon two things: first, whether the learner already possesses any experience with which to interpret it; and second, whether the new perception comes in such a way that it calls up this interpreting experience. Both of these conditions the teacher can understand and at least partially control. He can, before he presents a new topic, investigate what the child already knows about it. This will tell him whether the child can apperceive the topic at all and, if so, to what extent and in what way. If the child already possesses a fund of apperceiving material sufficient to make the topic profitable, it may be presented. The method of presentation, however, will depend on what the child already knows. This is brought out in a preparatory step. Such a preparation brings all or the most valuable part of the related experience possessed by the child actively to bear on the new idea, thus insuring its apperception. It also gives the teacher his clue as to what the child can learn, and what he needs to learn in order to complete his view of the subject. Later, as the new subject becomes better mastered, the teacher can suggest the connections between it and other related subjects—thus increasing the degree of organization of material in the pupil's mind. Finally, the ideas thus mastered can be continually revived at the suggestion of the teacher in order to interpret new material or solve new problems. Thus the idea of appreception can have a very decided influence upon this method of instruction.
From the point of view of the course of study also, the notion of apperception is of the greatest importance. For it implies that each subject as a whole be selected with reference to the child's particular stage of development; that it be so graded that the work of every day prepares for the next; and that all the subjects be so correlated that the growing knowledge of each shall constantly redound to the benefit of all.
The idea of apperception has in recent years received a new development because of the discovery that what causes new subjects to be seized and assimilated by the mind is not merely that they are seen to be related to familiar experience, but that their mastery is felt to be worth while. To use the illustration employed earlier, the savage is interested in the nugget and apperceives it, because he sees that he can make use of it in a very fruitful way. The intenser apperception of the civilized man is due to the great value that gold has for him in the social world he inhabits. From this point of view the teacher is seen to have the task of not merely connecting the new object with familiar experience but also that of helping the child to see how, in the light of his experience, the comprehension of the new topic is worth while. To get the observer to apperceive the nugget properly, it may not only be necessary to tell him that it is that familiar thing, gold, but to get him to see how valuable a thing it is to know about and to possess. To be sure, experience would be the only source of this valuation. Yet the child may need help to get from experience the values that will inspire him to enlarge his experience and power along specific lines. Thus, through a proper utilization of his experience the savage might be led to see the value that gold has for civilization and so to apperceive it quite differently. In this aspect apperception is very intimately related to Interest.
Some psychologists now use the term apperception to cover all that the mind adds to what is at the moment given by the senses. In this meaning it signifies the interpretation by the mind, not of perception, but rather of sensation. Perception itself is a gradual outgrowth of experience and therefore involves apperception. This use of the term leads to no important educational consequences that are not involved in the other.
See Association of Ideas, Interest, Teaching, Method of, Mental Discipline, Psychology for Teachers.
Consult Apperception, Lange; General Method and Method of the Recitation, Mc-Murry; The Educative Process, Bagley; and The Point of Contact in Teaching, Du Bois.