Experimental Study of Associative Processes 71 



TABLE 3 



struggles in pressing down the thumb piece, so that if the 

 door had been free to swing open, they could have escaped. 

 Six succeeded in pushing both thumb-piece down and door 

 out, so that the bar did not fall back into its place. Of 

 these five succeeded in also later pushing the door open, 

 so that they escaped and got the fish 

 outside. Of these, three, after re- 

 peated trials, associated the com- 

 plicated movements required with 

 the sight of the interior of the box so 

 firmly that they attacked the thumb 

 latch the moment they were put in. 

 The history of the formation of the 

 association in the case of 3 and of 4 is 

 shown in the curves in Figs. 6 and 7. 

 In the case of 13 the exact times were 

 not taken. The combination of ac- 

 cidents required was enough to make 

 No. i and No. 6 take a long time 

 to get out. Consequently, weariness 

 and failure inhibited their impulses 

 to claw, climb, etc., more than the 

 rare pleasure from getting out 

 strengthened them, and they failed 

 to form the association. Like the 

 cats who utterly failed to get out, they finally ceased 

 to try when put in. The history of their efforts is as in 

 Table 3 : the figures in the columns represent the time (in 

 minutes and seconds) the animal was in the box before 

 escaping or before being taken out if he failed to es- 

 cape. Cases of failure are designated by an F after the 

 figures. Double lines represent an interval of twenty-four 

 hours. 



