6.3

James' chapter on The Will appeared to integrate many of the ideas from the other chapters.  Some of these ideas included attention, habit, and the acquisition of ideas.  I picked up on the concept of attention as it relates to The Will as I read the chapter, but my understanding of the relationship was further solidified through the video.  Toward the end of the video, the speaker discussed how James related attention to beliefs.  We pay attention to what we believe in and we believe what we pay attention to.  This concept made a lot of sense to me.  It is hard to believe something that we are not paying attention to.  However, belief is a complex concept in and of itself so I wonder how James would further explain belief and what it mean to believe.  Perhaps in the book on religion the Dr. Usher has mentioned he discusses this idea further.

James made the distinction between habit and will by discussing inhibitions.  James says, "Voluntary action, then, is at all times a resultant of the compounding of our impulsions with our inhibitions" (p. 87).  James discusses how we do not react to every thought in a motor or behavioral way.  We have inhibitions that help us push down some impulsions completely while substituting others.  I am reminded of how I have to make decisions about what to work on while I am at work.  School psychology requires a significant amount of juggling with multiple evaluations and reports in progress at a time as well as interventions and consultation.  If every time a project came into my mind, I started working on it, I would never get anything done.  So I have to use inhibitions to chose what I work on and for how long before I switch to another task, even when other tasks may cross my mind as I am reminded of them. 

I was struck by how much I believe James would support the current initiative for Positive Behavior Intervention and Support (PBIS).  The principle behind PBIS is to reward good behavior instead of punishing bad behavior.  The chapter and the video both discussed how James felt it was better for students to learn to chose good for the sake of good instead of substituting it for bad.  This is the idea behind PBIS and research has shown that this approach is successful at managing student behavior and improving school climates.  James seemed to have seen the advantage to this approach even at the time when teachers were still allowed to use corporal punishment, which I find interesting.