A Study in Reaction Time and Movement.

The problem of reaetioo ti Ae.has already been studied by many psychologists of grea1thit3citLTJ ie various influences which lengthen or shorten reaction time.K yebeen worked out, and at first sight it would seem a most uft5ron7isilg fild of research. And if the attempt had been made to stuciy.resctian .time alone, it is scarcely probable that anything new an Sifrt-: i portant could have been brought to light. But while reaction time itself has been quite thoroughly studied, the movement by which the reaction is made has received but little attention. This neglect has arisen, in all probability, from the fact that when the problem of reaction time was being actively discussed the attention of psychologists was focused upon representative and not upon motor processes. Only of late years has movement come to the foreground, as an object of psychological study. Motor processes are being recognized more and more as important elements in conscious processes. Professor Mtinsterberg has even gone so far as to assert that consciousness is absolutely dependent upon the possibility of a motor discharge. The evident endeavor which asserts itself in many quarters to bring in motor processes to explain the fact of consciousness, makes it all the more important that they should be the object of experimental research. And on this account, too, a study in the psychology of movement has a value over and above whatever technical merits it may possess. Even purely physiological and anatomical studies of movement are found to have their paths of connection long perhaps, but clearly marked with the broader highways of philosophical inquiry. For whether the new theories are right or wrong, they will not and ought not to be laid aside, till subjected to the most searching and critical tests. And in the very nature of the case the study of movement will be of prime importance in th
(Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.)