The next question that arises is: why did only a few persons receive
responses regularly from Hans, whereas the greater number were favored
only occasionally? What was the selective principle involved? The answer
is, that the successful person had to belong to a certain type, which
embodied the following essential characteristics.
1. A certain measure of ability and tact in dealing with the horse. As
in the case of dealing with wild animals, such as the lion, etc., Hans
must not be made uneasy by timidity in the questioner, but must be
approached with an air of quiet authority.
2. The power of intense concentration, whether in expectation of a
certain sensory impression (the final tap), or in fixing attention upon
some idea-content ("yes", "no", etc.). It is only when expectancy and
volition are very forceful, that a sufficient release of tension can
ensue. This release of tension is accompanied by a change in innervation
and results in a perceptible movement. And it was only when the thought
of "yes", or "up", etc., was very vivid, that the nervous energy would
spread to the motor areas and thence to the efferent fibers, and thus
result in the head-movement of the questioner. From infancy we are
trained to keep all of our voluntary muscles under a certain measure of
control. During the state of concentration just described, this control
is relaxed, and our whole musculature becomes the instrument for the
play of non-voluntary impulses. The stronger the customary control, the
stronger must the stimuli be which can overcome it. The steady
unremitting fixation, which resulted in the horse's selection of the
cloths, also involves a high degree of concentration.
3. Facility of motor discharge. Great concentration was necessary of
course, but not sufficient. Persons in whom the flow of nervous energy
tended to drain off over the nerves leading to the glands and the
vascular system might betray great tension, not so much by movements as
by a flow of perspiration (we have many excellent examples of this given
by Manouvrier)[93] or by a violent beating of the heart, blushing and
the like,--in short, by secretory and vasomotor effects. Or it is not
inconceivable that long dealing with very abstract thoughts might have
weakened the tendency of overflow to other parts of the brain, and that
therefore the entire discharge is used up in those portions of the brain
which are the basis of the intellectual processes. But if expressive
movements occur, the motor pathways must be particularly unresisting in
order to take up the overflow of psychophysic energy. This is the
necessary condition for obtaining the tapping and the head movements on
the part of the horse, although for the tapping there is still one other
circumstance necessary: viz.,
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