In the experiments in counting and computation, the questioner, standing
at my right, thought with a high degree of concentration of some number
(usually between 1 and 10, but sometimes also as high as 100), or of
some simple problem in addition. Then I would begin to tap,--but in
human fashion with my right hand, rather than with my foot--and
continued until I believed that I had perceived a final signal. I thus
tested, all in all, twenty-five persons, of every age and sex (including
children of five and six years), differing also in nationality and
occupation. None of them was aware of the purpose of the experiments. It
could not escape them, to be sure, that they were being watched. It was
also evident to them that the things noted were certain tensions and
movements; but none of my subjects discovered what the particular
phenomena were that I was looking for. Only in a few isolated instances
did they report that they were conscious of any movements on their part.
With the exception of two persons, they all made the same involuntary
movements which were described in chapter II, the most important of
which was the sudden slight upward jerk of the head when the final
number was reached. It was at once evident that the direction of this
jerk depended upon the position which one had asked the subject to
assume at the beginning of the test, the direction changing whenever the
position was changed. Thus, if the subject stood with head bowed--the
body either being held erect or likewise bowed,--then release of tension
would be expressed physically by an upward jerk. (Occasionally the
entire trunk is slightly raised, so that it was possible to observe this
physical reaction when standing behind the subject). If the subject had
bent his head backward, the "psychological moment" was marked by a
forward movement, (although under certain conditions the head was, in
such a case, observed to bend still farther backward). If during the
tests the head was bent slightly to the right, then the reaction was
expressed in a movement toward the left, and _vice versa_, if it had
been on the left, it was bent to the right. If the subject had been
bending his head forward and to the right, he then raised it upward and
to the left, etc. In all of these changes of position I noticed an
intermediate posture which, to be sure, it was not always an easy matter
to discover,--viz.: an upright position in which there was discernible
no manner of head-movement or only a slight tremor. If the subject was
lying on his back with his head supported, then there was noticeable a
very slight movement to one side. In this same way a number of other
positions were tested in order to discover for each the characteristic
movement expressive of release of tension. It would therefore appear
that the raising of the questioner's head, which served as the signal
for stopping for Mr. von Osten's horse, was but one instance of a
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