The method of right and wrong cases was used in the next group of
experiments, to secure the same conditions of making the judgment in
each of the three cases used above. Selecting a letter near the middle
of each series, I asked the observer, in each of these cases, just as
in that of the single letter, to say whether the click was before,
on, or after the letter. I worked _out_, in successive experiments by
successive adjustments, from the position of apparent simultaneity
of click and letter, in both directions, to a point where in 75% of
the cases the click seemed to come before; and also to one where it
seemed to come after, in 75% of the cases. So also I worked _in_ both
ways, by successive adjustments, from regions of clear discrimination
of time-difference and direction, to points where the time-relation
was uncertain or wrong in 75% of the trials. By averaging the just
perceptible and the just not perceptible, in each case, the thresholds
were obtained for "click first" and "click last." The time between
these thresholds I call the "range." It is really a measure of James's
"specious present" and of Stern's "Präsenzzeit." (An admirable
presentation of similar results by Wilhelm Peters[114] has appeared
since this work was done.) The best means of comparing these results,
for our present purposes, and also of bringing them into relation with
the complication-results already obtained, is to take the mean point
between these thresholds, and state its position, in time, relative to
the time of the visual stimulus (letter) just before or after which
the click came. This mean point is called the "Threshold Mean" in the
following tables. In Table IV, for example, "After Letter .026 sec."
means that the mean point between the thresholds, "click first" and
"click last" falls twenty-six sigmas after the time of the exposure of
the letter. These results are readily comparable with those of Peters.
By dividing the "range" by two, and adding the "threshold mean" to one
half, and subtracting it from the other, one has the total interval
between "click first" and "click last" and its place with reference to
the time of the visual stimulus.
TABLE IV
_Obs._ _Twelve Letters_ _Three Letters_ _One Letter_
A Threshold Mean After After
Letter .026 sec. On Letter .041 sec. Letter .020 sec.
Range .093 sec. .062 sec.
G Threshold Mean Before Before After
Letter .015 sec. Letter .020 sec. Letter .062 sec.
Range .072 sec. .083 sec. .304 sec.
Sh Threshold Mean Before After After
Letter .003 sec. Letter .027 sec. Letter .003 sec.
Range .172 sec. .111 sec. .241 sec.
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