avenues. As an infant you used all senses impartially in your eager
search after information. You voraciously put things into your mouth
and discovered that some things were sweet, some sour. You bumped your
head against things and learned that some were hard and some soft. In
your insatiable curiosity you pulled things apart and peered into them;
in short, utilized all the sense organs. In adult life, however, and in
education as it takes place through the agency of books and
instructors, most learning depends upon the eye and ear. Even yet,
however, you learn many things through the sense of touch and through
muscle movement, though you may be unaware of it. You probably have
better success retaining impressions made upon one sense than another.
The majority of people retain better things that are visually
impressed. Such persons think often in terms of visual images. When
thinking of water running from a faucet, they can see the water fall,
see it splash, but have no trace of the sound. The whole event is
noiseless in memory. When they think of their instructor, they can see
him standing at his desk but cannot imagine the sound of his voice.
When striving to think of the causes leading to the Civil War, they
picture them as they are listed on the page of the text-book or
note-book. Other people have not this ability to recall in visual
terms, but depend to greater extent upon sounds. When asked to think
about their instructor, they do it in terms of his voice. When asked to
conjugate a French verb, they hear it pronounced mentally but do not
see it on the page. These are extremes of imagery type, but they
illustrate preferences as they are found in many persons. Some persons
use all senses with ease; others unconsciously work out combinations,
preferring one sense for some kinds of material and another for other
kinds. For example, one might prefer visual impression for remembering
dates in history but auditory impression for conjugating French verbs.
You will find it profitable to examine yourself and discover your