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The Cognitive Element in Musical Response
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2020
Extract
An examination of our mental state at any moment of conscious experience reveals three distinguishable aspects in the relation of the “subject” experiencing and the “object” experienced, viz.: (1) the subject becoming aware of, or knowing the object, (2) the subject being attracted or repelled (pleased or pained) by the object, and (3) the subject attending to the object. These three relations are named respectively, cognition, affection (or feeling), and attention. Though they are readily distinguishable it must not be supposed that they occur in isolation; rather, they are all present at one and the same instant, being interdependent, but varying from time to time in relative predominance. Thus, when an unfamiliar object is presented to the subject, the cognitive process is by far the most important, but at a later stage when the object has become fully determinate, affection and attention are in the ascendant, the subject ultimately doing work upon the object (that is, attending to the object)—making its own positive contribution towards a change in the subject-object relation.
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- Copyright © Royal Musical Association, 1945