99 
the very reason that every component of the word is heard as 
distinctly as the others, excludes guessing almost altogether and 
facilitates the finding of a definite zone of the scale. The question 
arises, however, though it is not probable, whether the hearing 
distance extends for whispered sentences as far as for words and 
vowels. ZWAARDEMAKER believes on the ground of various experiences 
that the distance at which whispered sentences are heard in a closed 
space amounts to 1 to 3 m.*) according to the words that are chosen. 
He calls the relation between this average distance and that at which 
whispered sounds are heard: inder loquelae. 
In the present investigation we purposed originally only to determine 
the index loquelae. However, the combination of the whisper-method 
with that of the systematic or experimental introspection, procured 
us a number of data of some importance for the psychology of 
perception. We availed ourselves of these data only in so far as 
they influence the determination of the index loquelae, the subject 
proper of this paper. 
The material used by us consisted of rather simple sentences. The 
shortest consisted of 3, the longest of 14 syllables. Most often the 
sentences were in the indicative mood, seldom in the subjunctive 
mood or in the imperative mood. Though the present tense was used 
most frequently, we sometimes also employed the past and the future. 
Negative sentences were rare. In selecting our material we took an 
adequate number of symmetrical sentences, i.e. sentences having the 
same number of syllables before and after the copula, which consisted 
of one syllable, or an even number of syllables, or we chose such 
sentences as were divided by a word or by appropiate punctuation 
into two parts of an equal number of syllables (e.g. waste not, want 
not; a friend in need is a friend indeed). In most sentences there 
was a subject, a predicate and an object in the given order; sentences 
without one of these parts or with a verb split up as the construction 
required, we term irregular sentences. Proverbs and proverbial sayings 
were seldom used; sometimes, but not often, a French or Latin 
sentence was presented to the subject. All in all we made 328 
experiments with 4 subjects (R., M., D. and A). Table I gives a 
survey of the material with respect to the number of syllables, the 
symmetry and the asymmetry, the regular or the irregular construction 
of the sentences. It should be noted, that some test-sentences have 
1) ZWAARDEMAKER. Ueber die Anwendung von Sig. Exners Akustik von Hörsälen 
auf die Theorie der medizinischen Hörapparate. Wiener Medizinische Wochenschrift. 
Nr. 14, 1926. 
7% 
