m».30 PSYCHOLOGICAL EXAMINING IN THE UNITED STATES ARMY. 831 



Our railroads were classified as essential industries, and exemptions have undoubtedly 

 occurred in the case of locomotive enginemen and firemen. Those enginemen and firemen who 

 failed to obtain exemption are probably those who, because of inferior ability, were unable to 

 secure the necessary affidavits declaring them to be "necessary for the industry." The data 

 for these two groups is therefore probably unreliable. That the engineer group has a rating 

 slightly (although not significantly) inferior to that of the firemen group seems to indicate that 

 the ratings of men in these two groups have been seriously affected by "selection." 



It is entirely possible that many of the occupational groups (particularly those skilled and 

 technical trades in the middle of the graph) are misplaced relative to one another, and it is pos- 

 sible too that many of them show too low a median rating. The exemptions granted the 

 ''necessary highly specialized technical or mechanical expert of necessary industrial enterprise" 

 have undoubtedly tended to leave as representative of the affected trade those who are below 

 the average attainments of the trade in civil life. In addition to that specific exemption factor 

 we have the fact that those in a given trade who were married and had dependents were 

 exempted. It is reasonable to suppose that those skilled and technical workers in a trade that 

 have married and thus assumed the social and family responsibility involved therein are superior 

 on the average to those who have remained unmarried and were therefore not placed in deferred 

 classification. 



Among the professional groups we find similar selective factors at work to lower the ratings 

 of those groups. For example, it is doubtful whether the "accountants" found in draft quotas 

 are representative of accountants found in civil life. It is probable that most "certified public 

 accountants" were exempted because of marriage, involving dependents, or because their 

 technical and expert knowledge was needed by essential industrial enterprises. 



It is probable that some of the occupational groups show a reverse tendency, viz, a higher 

 median intelligence rating than is typical for the corresponding group in civil life. It is possible 

 that the group of "stenographers and typists " is such. It has been suggested that many college 

 and university students who had learned to use a typewriter classified themselves occupationally 

 as "typists" upon arrival in depot brigades, and it is certain that a majority of college and 

 university students are above the average intelligence of stenographers and typists in civil life, 

 as the latter rarely go beyond high school. It must also be remembered that male stenog- 

 raphers and typists are not typical representatives of that particular clerical occupation in civil 

 life. The United States Census, 1910, states that female stenographers and typists are five 

 times as frequent as males. 



In the preceding paragraphs enough has been said to indicate that the occupational intelli- 

 gence standards are representative of draft quotas only, and that because of selective factors 

 these Army standards may be quite different from the standards of civil life. Not only 

 must the selective factors be considered but the accuracy of the personnel classification system 

 must be taken into account in determining the significance of the data at hand. The trade 

 classification of the men was based on the personnel interviewing method. Trade tests had not 

 come into general use at the time the study was made. It is possible that the personnel inter- 

 viewing method was sufficiently inaccurate to affect the reliability of the occupational intelli- 

 gence standards. 



A study of table 377 shows that consistent significant differences in mental ability between 

 apprentices, journeymen, and experts are not present. Of the 32 occupations in group A, we 

 find only 16 which show the experts as superior to the journeymen and journeymen superior to 

 apprentices. And these 16 cases involved only the alpha ratings. With regard to the beta 

 ratings, only 6 occupations show these differences. The differences that are present are only 

 slight; for the alpha ratings the differences between the medians of the three degrees of skill 

 vary from 2 to 13 points, the median difference being 7 points. The beta ratings are not so 

 consistent. These differences vary between 2 points and 34 points, the median difference being 

 11 points. 



It seems reasonable to suppose that a selective process goes on in industry which results in 

 a selection of the mentally more alert for promotion from the apprentice stage to the journeymen 



