The mental traits of sex : an experimental investigation of the normal mind in men and women / by Helen Bradford Thompson.

  • Helen Thompson Woolley
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The mental traits of sex : an experimental investigation of the normal mind in men and women / by Helen Bradford Thompson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    85/208 (page 71)
    sented in the abscissas of the curves of results (Fig. 43). Since the lowest fork (twelve vibrations per second) was not below the possible limits of pitch, the subjects could not in this case be given the con- trast between pitch, and vibrations with no pitch. The experiments were be- ¢ gun with the forks of high ¢ vibration rate, and worked 7] down to the limit. The <j subject kept hiseyesclosed during thetest. Each fork was sounded close to his ear several times. He was asked to tell each time whether the sound 2% » GS tt & ~ 20 Ae SA YO Ve Ge ¥ he heard could be called FIG. 43. atone or not. The lower Lower limit of pitch. a. ‘ : ; Abscissas—vibrations per second limit of pitch is subjec- of the forks used. tively much harder to fix Ordinates—number of subjects. than “thes upper:.=Asithe 00 2° Ta vibration rate decreases, the smooth singing tone changes into a pulsating sound which still has a certain pitch quality. Many subjects found it very difficult to fix upon the point where the sound lost its pitch quality. An attempt was made to control the judg- ment by requiring discriminations of higher and lower in doubtful cases, but this proved to be impracticable; in the first place, because discriminative sensibility at the lower limit is so coarse; and in the second place, because the difference of vibration rate could be felt as the air struck the ear and an indirect judgment as to pitch, based on vibration rate, was unavoidable. The results therefore contain the source of error due to differences in individual standards.