no. 2] PSYCHOLOGICAL EXAMINING IN THE UNITED STATES ARMY. 481 



the usefulness of the work depended on its results being in the hands of unit commanders before 

 the units were organized. Requests for information concerning companies, regiments, and 

 individual recruits required immediate answers. Systematic procedure was often impossible. 

 The more rapidly and completely a command could be handled, the easier the administration 

 of examining became and the more open-minded were officers toward the usefulness of intelli- 

 gence ratings. Examination b seemed an unnecessary repetition. 



The second consideration that led to the disuse of examination b arose from the findings 

 on it as a method. It is not our purpose to discuss these results in detail at this point. It 

 seems more than probable that a modification of examination b, or, what is practically the 

 same thing, increased time on certain tests in examination a, would have met two important 

 objections to group examination a for literates. It was held that examination a was not f au- 

 to those who are "slow but sure," and that the time was so short that the majority had no 

 opportunity to try more than half or two-thirds of the test. 1 In other words, the feeling that 

 they had in nowise reached the limit of their ability produced among examinees considerable 

 real dissatisfaction with the examination as a whole. Statistical studies showed that examina- 

 tion b ought to be given to all who had taken examination a, if it was given to any. 



Examination a was furnished to the four cantonments with full scoring procedure, stand- 

 ardized norms, and detailed directions for its interpretation. No specific information on prac- 

 tice gains for examination b was available and no norms were furnished for its use. The decision 

 to retain examination a without supplementary use of examination b seemed justified by the 

 situation met in the camps. 



Examination b was therefore discarded as a part of the testing procedure in three of the 

 camps. Camp Devens continued to use it during the fall work. They reported that with its 

 use they were able to reduce the number of individual examinations quite materially. It was 

 given once a week to men who had made between 30 and 70 in examination a. If the 

 weighted score of the seven tests of examination b was 70 or more, the man was excused from 

 individual examination. By this means the amount of individual examination required was 

 reduced to about half of what would otherwise have been indicated as necessary. 



In the selection of high-grade men examination a exceeded the expectations of the staffs 

 in the four cantonments. The specific successes stood out as advertising media frequently 

 with rather alarming sharpness. It will be remembered that psychological examining began 

 early in October, 1917. A few scattered groups were examined late in September, but these 

 were groups selected at random, and primarily used for standardizing procedure and training 

 examiners. The troops examined had been in camp almost two months. They were relatively 

 few in number. As a result officers knew them and had estimated then- ability on the basis of 

 performance. Few auxiliary troop organizations had been established, hence there was an 

 abundance of good material for special duty, for nonco mm issioned officer positions, for squad 

 leaders, and assistant instructors in drill, and for teaching military regulations. 



Into this locally adjusted situation psychological examining entered to pick its own clerks, 

 to select men for special organizations, and to point out both those who had made good and 

 those who would do so, as well as those who probably never would fit into the Army. The 

 results were uniform in all four cantonments. The selection of clerks by means of the psy- 

 chological examination from details sent the examiners for that purpose always brought com- 

 plaints from company commanders that their best men were being taken away from them, 

 that the leading men of the company were in the group selected as assistants to the examiners. 

 Efforts on the part of commanding officers to organize new units by selecting men according 

 to psychological score aroused similar objections. In this early period requests from company 

 officers to designate their low-grade men were frequently received. It was soon discovered 

 that those requests followed close on an order to select and prepare for transfer out of camp a 



i For discussion of similar objections raised in connection with the problem of time limits for examination alpha, see ch. 9, pp. 415 ff. 



