4 



THi. EFJJ'KOT OJJ' AGh OA HABIT FUHKiATIOU liJ THt ALBINO HAT. 



INTRODUGTIOU. 



The ].roblem ooncerning the relation of the age of an 

 animal to its learning Gaj.acity forma the basis for the in- 

 vestigation herein discussed. Exi.eriments were begun in the 

 Psychological Laboratory of The Johns Hopkins University dur- 

 ing the winter of 1912, and continued until the spring of 

 1915. 



HISTORICAL. 



So far as the writer has been able to determine, prac- 

 tically no experimental work has been undertaken on the rela- 

 tion of age to learning ability, although the importance of 

 the problen has been generally conceded. 



In the field of human psychology, I^unn carried out a 

 series of "substitution tests" on children in the grades, on 

 normal school pupils, and on two elderly persons, to determine 

 the relative rapidity of gain in ability to make the required 

 substitutions. Her records were taken in the terms cf time, 

 and showed that althoiigh the children gained much more rapid- 

 ly than the alults, their actual rate of speed at the begin- 

 ning was lov.er, and they did not reacli the same levol of effi- 



1. I.^unn - Curve of Learning, Archives of Psychol. IIo. 12, p. 

 37. 



