Latent inhibition is a mental process in which an individual does not create any association or meaning with a presented stimulus until a later period. Psychologists classify this process under the classical conditioning type of learning. A person does not learn or experience any change from initial exposure to a stimulus.
A common cause of latent inhibition is that the person is unfamiliar with the stimulus and automatically regards it as insignificant or irrelevant to him. This lack of awareness tends to be involuntary, which means that the process is automatically carried out by the brain. This is a way to ensure that sensory overload does not occur, which can cause an individual to lose their focus on a certain task. This can cause some delay in learning about a specific object, but it also helps a person learn and focus more on important stimuli.
Although the mental process is an automatic reaction, there are still people who find it difficult to ignore the stimuli. These people are said to have low latent inhibition, causing them to notice irrelevant and trivial stimuli. People with this trait are easily distracted and highly sensitive; both traits can lead to social ineptitude. The effects of low latency can depend on a person's IQ. If a person has a high IQ, probably 130 or higher, their low latent inhibition may manifest in creativity, while people whose IQs are lower than average may suffer from psychosis.
A talented or genius person with low latent inhibition, coupled with a good memory, tends to allow all kinds of information to be processed, leading to creative and innovative thinking. They are also more capable of abstract and conceptual thought. The ability to sift through all the information and distinguish what is useful from what is not also contributes to creativity; Lack of this ability can cause a disordered state of mind. Some scientists believe that latent inhibition is a way to explain the correlation between genius and insanity.
Low latent inhibition may explain why some historical people led troubled lives. Robert Goddard, for example, was ridiculed in his time for his idea of rockets. Today, many space explorations were achieved due to his invention of the liquid fuel rocket. Socrates, a thinker and philosopher, was not well liked by his peers. He was labeled immoral due to his ideas and was even sentenced to death. His contributions on the principles of knowledge, virtue and ethics still have a great influence in the field of humanities.