60 



WALTER S. HUNTER 

 TABLE XV 



the first one-third of the trials were at 50 sees. Reactions were 

 perfect. The last two thirds of the day's work was at i min. 

 and both times she fell below 50%. There were no known 

 extraneous factors to cause this. The conditions were as near 

 ideal as possible. The method adopted with F, after the first 

 three days, was one of slow advance from stage to stage. At 

 the higher delays, each day's work was begun — as just illus- 

 trated — with the longest interval that had been mastered. Some 

 5 trials were given here and only if the reactions were perfect 

 was an advance made. I believe that entire dependence can 

 be placed upon the results obtained. F was the only one of 

 the children that did not reach a delay of at least 20 mins. 



F was distracted continually. She needed to keep neither 

 her attention nor any part of her body constant in order to 

 react correctly on delays up through 50 sees. She often hesi- 

 tated and wavered in making the choice of buttons. It is inter- 

 esting to note in this connection that this wavering, hesitant 

 behavior was only noted in the case of the raccoons and children. 

 Every individual of these gave many examples of it. This is 

 significant when it is borne in mind that these subjects used 

 apparently the same method in solving the problem. If that 

 statement is too broad, at least it may be said that they agreed 

 in not using gross motor orientation exclusively as did the rats 

 and dogs. This is not the very usual type of behavior described 

 by Yerkes for the dancing mouse. He says: "I have at times 

 seen a mouse run from one entrance to the other twenty times 

 before making its choice ; now and then it would start to enter 

 one and, when half way in, draw back as if it had been shocked. 

 Possibly merely touching the wires with its forepaws was re- 



