10

READING PASSAGE 3 3 on poges 10 ond 11.

g Possogo
Answer Questions 33-46, which oro bosod on Readin

ns ci ou s Thought
Conscious and Unco . . .
ut a dec1sIon; in another
Great scientists and artists have long caref �lly ab� hey were di s tracted by an
known about the unconscious mind. experiment k whilst m aking a decision.
The founder of psychoanalysis, irrele vant.t��g result, publi s hed in the
Sigmund Freud, argued that most of our The s urpris ersonality an d Social
real motivation lies below conscious Journal of P was that 'unconscious'
Psychol ogy,
awareness and that we require the e the better decisions.
think� rs ma dWil
services of a psychoanalyst to explain son and collea g ues
T1mothy · . . ,
ourselves to ourselve s. Even those ty of v ,r gtnta s
celebrated scienti s ts who believe that from the Universi tmen t con ducted
r
Psycho I ogy depaent.
Freud exaggerated the importance of .. pants were
p art1c1
the unconsciou s argue that it i s a part of another experim posters and asked to
our minds which we should learn to presented With five me. A 1.ttt1 e later,
control and take advantage of. choose one to take ho d
asked how
The great mathematician Alfred th y were telephoned an ir oice
sa�sfied they were with the ch -a
North Whitehead seemed to be a
supporter of unconscious mental measure of whether they had made the
processing when he said: 'It is a right decision from a subjective point of
profoundly erroneous truism, repeated view. Some participants had picked
by all copybooks and by eminent their poster straight away, whereas
people making speeches, that we others were asked to analyse carefully
should cultivate the habit of thinking the pros and cons of each poster. It
about what we are doing. The precise turned out that people who had
opposite is the case.' What Whitehead analysed were less satisfied with their
meant by this is that some of the choice than people who had not
greatest breakthroughs in creativity applied logic. Paradoxically, it seems
occur when a problem is consciously that those who had consciously
shelved for a while - 'don't think about weighed up the various attributes had
it, just sleep on it' - after which the made relatively poor decisions.
unconscious mind offers a solution. The conclusion that has to be drawn
This is a process which psychoanalysts from current research suggests the
call 'incubation'. somewhat counter-intuitive idea that
Now the latest psychological t�e m�re complex a problem is, the less
research confirms that we can all likely 1t becomes that conscious thought
incubate a problem to our own can contr ibute much. If a dilemma is
advantage. Ap Dijksterhuis, a
particularly difficult, a lot of info mation
psychologist at the University of r
has to be taken into ac
Amsterdam, has recently pub I ished a count an d it
appears that consciou
series of experiments in which students s thought is not
were presented with complex everyday �ood at this. The message is that when
it comes to intri
problems to solve. In one experiment cate problems with
many variable
they were ·giv.en an OJ?portunity to think s, you should let the
unconsc iou
s deal with it.
 11

Using dreaming Is one way of doing

this. Dreams arc the part of sleep most
strongly correlated with rapid eye
movement (REM) and have been
associated with enhanced creativity and
novel solutions. The latest research
suggests that, if you want to enhance
unconscious problem-solving, you
should try to think about your problems
immediately after dreaming. In a recent
experiment, psychiatrist Matthew
Walker and colleagues from the
Laboratory of Neurophysiology at
Harvard Medical School woke up half
of their experimental subjects
immediately after REM sleep, and the
other half just after sleep with no
dreams, and then asked them to solve
crossword puzzles. REM awakenings
provided a 32 per cent advantage in the
number of puzzles solved, compared
with non-REM awakenings.
But you don't have to be asleep to
use the unconscious mind when you
are not thinking of anything in
particular, which is why daydreams are
so useful in the quest for creativity.
Daniel Goleman, the famous
psychologist who proposed the theory
of 'emotional intelligence', urges us to
be more aware of, and discount, a key
obstacle that the conscious mind
imposes on the unconscious: that of
self-censorship. This is the voice that
whispers to you, 'they'll think I'm
foolish' or 'that will never work',
keeping you imprisoned within the
boundaries of what is deemed
acceptable. Howard Gardner, a
professor of cognition and education at
Harvard University, suggests that we
free ourselves from the straitjacket of
always doing things the same way. In
seeking to go beyond the routine and
conventional, you will gain confidence
in trusting your unconscious, he says.
 1
1 •· -•· •-

12

Questions 33 - 3 7
e ople below.
. 33-3 7) an d the list of p
Look at the following statements (Questions

Match each statement with the correct person, A-F.

answer sneet.
Write the correct Jetter, A-F, in boxes 33-37 on your

pro blems at a p art ic u lar point in the sleep cycle.

33 People find it easier to solve
ns in order to benefit more from
34 People should change their general behaviour patter
the unconscious.
ghts.
35 When solving problems, people should try to ignore negative thou

36 People can come up with ideas which are more innovative if they temporarily put a
problem aside.

37 People who make quick decisions are less likely to regret them.

List of People

A Alfred North Whitehead

B Ap Dijksterhuis
C Timothy Wilson
0 Matthew Walker
E Daniel Goleman
F Howard Gardner
 13

Questions 38 - 40

complete the summary below.

ChOOSe NO MORE THAN 7WO WORDS from the p
assage for each answer.
.,.,, e your answers in boxes 38-40 on your answer s heet.
•A'ri/

Many scientiSts argue that people should make better use of their unconscious mind. Alfred
North Whitehead, for example, gave support for h
t e idea of 38 ............ : a term for people

I
deliberately ignoring a problem over a period of time.
Experiments in Amsterdam that required students to consider a tricky situation found
them making good decisio ns while carrying out an unconnected 39 .. .... ...... . Similarly, an
experiment in Virginia which required subjects to make a selection from a n umber of
different 40 •· • • • ....... found people feeling happier with their decisions if they had made them
quickly.
I,.

Questions 41- 46

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?

In boxes 41-46 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

41 Our unconscious mind helps us more than our conscious mind with complex
problems.
42 Resting before going to sleep can result in improved solutions to problems.

43 Problems are more likely to be solved after dreamless sleep.

44 Matthew Walker's team assessed their subjects using a memory test.
45 Daydreams are more helpful to the unconscious than dreams which occur during
sleep.

46 People often create their own barriers to problem-solving.