Acute Effects of the Complex.
Reality sees to it that the quiet circles of egocentric ideation are frequently disturbed by strong feeling tones, so called affects. A situation threatening danger pushes aside the tranquil play of ideas and places in its stead a complex of other ideas of the strongest feeling-tone. The new complex then appears very prominently, crowding all the others into the background. It totally inhibits all other ideas, retaining only those direct egocentric ideas which fit its situation. Under certain conditions it can even momentarily suppress to complete unconsciousness the strongest contrary ideas. It has the strongest attention-tone. (We therefore do not say we concentrate attention on anything, but the state of attention enters into this presentation. See "Diagnost. Assoc.-Stud.," I. Beitrag, Abschnitt B. L.)
Where does an ideational complex get its inhibiting or promoting force?
We have seen that the ego-complex on account of its union with the general sensations of the body is the most stable and richest in associations. The perception of a situation threatening danger excites fear. Fear is an affect, hence it is accompanied by physical conditions, by a complicated harmony of muscular tension and excitation of the sympathetic. The perception has therefore found the way to bodily innervation and in this manner has immediately helped its association-complex to get the upper hand. Owing to this fear numberless general sensibilities of the body become changed, changing thereby most of the sensations lying at the foundation of the general ego. Corresponding to this the ordinary ego loses its attention-tone (or its clearness, or its promoting and inhibiting influence on other associations or other synonyms). It is compelled to give way to the stronger and other general sensations of the new complex. Notwithstanding this, it does not normally perish but remains as a feeble affect-ego[1] because even very strong affects
- ↑ The modification of the ego-complex resulting from the setting in of a markedly accentuated complex I designate as the "affect ego."
actions is always directed by an affect," or better expressed, "Attention is a side of affectivity which does nothing but that which is already known of it, that is, it smooths the way for certain associations and inhibits others."
