Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1: Containing Sixteen Experimental Investigations from the Harvard Psychological Laboratory.
Science
Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1: Containing Sixteen Experimental Investigations from the Harvard Psychological Laboratory.
Psychology, Experimental
shows by its shape how the points appear massed towards the center. In
Fig. 5 the curve _AB_ shows, by its crests at _A_ and _B_, that the
end points tended to free themselves from the rest in the judgments.
But if the distance _AB_ be taken to represent the average of the
judgments upon the filled space 1, 2, 3, 4, it will be seen to be
shorter than what may be regarded as the average of the judgments upon
the corresponding open space, namely, the distance _A'B'_, determined
by the localizations of the end points alone. The comparative
regularity of the curve indicates that the subject was unable to
discriminate among the points of the filling with any degree of
certainty. The localizations were scattered quite uniformly along the
line. In these short distances the subject often judged four points as
two, or even one.
[Illustration: Fig. 5.]
[Illustration: Fig. 6.]
Turning to Fig. 6, we notice that the tendency is now to locate the
end points in the filled distance outside of the localization of these
same points when given without the intermediate points. It will also
be seen from the irregularities in these two longer curves that there
is now a clear-cut tendency to single out the individual points. The
fact that the curves here are again higher over point 4 simply
signifies that at this, the wrist end, the failure to discover the
presence of the points was less frequent than towards the elbow. But
this does not disturb the relation of the two series of judgments. As
I have before said, the first two sets of experiments described in
Section II. showed that the shorter filled distances are
underestimated, while the longer distances are overestimated, and that
between the two there is somewhat of an 'indifferent zone.' In those
experiments the judgments were made directly on the cutaneous
distances themselves. In the experiments the results of which are
plotted in these curves, the judgment of distances is indirectly
reached through the function of localization. But it will be observed
that the results are substantially the same. The longer distances are
overestimated and the shorter distances underestimated. The curves in
Figs. 4, 5 and 6 were plotted on the combined results for two
subjects. But before the combination was made the two main tendencies
which I have just mentioned were observed to be the same for both
subjects.
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