Mental Reserve Capacities (MRC)

The central premise is that we all possess considerable mental reserves which we rarely if ever tap under normal circumstances. Among the examples of such capacities are the ability to learn rapidly and recall with ease large quantities or material, solve problems with great rapidity and spontaneous ease, respond to complex stimuli with facility and creativity. There is general agreement among researchers that the human being uses 5-10% of his/her brain capacity at the most. The primary objective is to tap into the MRC.

2. Psychological “Set-Up”

Our response to every stimuli is very complex, involving many unconscious processes which have become automatic responses. These are largely patterned responses - in many ways peculiar to us as individuals. The responses tend to be automatic and typical for them - the result of an inner, unconscious disposition or set-up, which is the product of automatized, conditioned responses. Our inner set-up operates when we encounter any situation - entering a school, being confronted with an opportunity - consulting a physician- as examples. Our inner, unconscious set-up is extremely basic and important to our behaviour and to our survival - and it can be extremely limiting, for it can imprison us in unconscious, consistently patterned responses which prevent us from experiencing and exploring other alternatives - which might be far more desirable and beneficial to us. Prevailing social norms, instilled in us by all our social institutions, including family and schools, are the main carriers and enforcers of the beliefs and responses which contribute to the formation of our inner set-up. Genetic and other factors contribute as well. The power of the influence of our unconscious set-up is very great, and any significant lasting change or overcoming of previous limits will necessarily involve a change in our unconscious patterns of response. This is why logical argumentation at the conscious level is often so useless - even when there is conscious agreement. This is why so much of the classroom experience remains an intellectual exercise: words, rhetorical mastery, even brilliance are of little lasting effect if they only engage the conscious levels of the student’s mind. Only when a teacher or a doctor is able to penetrate the set-up, engage it in a way which allows it to be accepting and open to extensions and transformation does the real potential of a student/patient begin to open up.

Suggestion

Suggestion is the key which Lozanov found to penetrate through the “set-up” and stimulate the mental reserve capacities.Even more, through suggestion we can facilitate the creation of new, richer patterns of conscious/unconscious responses or new (set-ups): “Suggestion is the direct road to the set-up. It creates and utilises such types of set-ups which would free and activate the reserve capacities of the human being.” (Lozanov: The Key Principles of Suggestopedia”, Journal of SALT, 1976, p.15)

There are two basic kinds of suggestion: direct and indirect. Direct suggestions are directed to conscious processes, i.e., what one says that can and will occur in the learning experience, suggestions which can be made in printed announcements, orally by the teacher, and/or by text materials. Direct suggestion is used sparingly, for it is most vulnerable to resistance from the set-up.

Indirect suggestion is largely unconsciously perceived and is much greater in scope than direct suggestion. It is always present in any communication and involves many levels and degrees of subtlety. Lozanov speaks of it as the second plane of communication and considers it to encompass all those communication factors outside our conscious awareness, such as voice tone, facial expression, body posture and movement, speech tempo, rhythms, accent, etc. Other important indirect suggestive effects result from room arrangement, decor, lighting, noise level, institutional setting - for all these factors are communicative stimuli which result in what Lozanov terms non-specific mental reactivity on the paraconscious level (at the level of the set-up). And they, like the teacher and materials can reinforce the set-up, preserve the status quo, or can serve in the desuggestive-suggestive process. In other words, everything in the communication/learning environment is a stimulus at some level, being processed at some level of mental activity. The more we can do to orchestrate purposefully the unconscious as well as the conscious factors in this environment, the greater the chance to break through or “de-suggest” the conditioned, automatic patterns of our inner set-up and open the access to the great potential of our mental reserves.

Date: 2016-01-03; view: 847