EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS 



21 



the average for the first trial of the multiple choice test. How much 

 this difference is due to what the average animal acquired in the 

 first experiment can not be determined since the tests themselves are 

 markedly different. 10 In the first place, the distance to be traversed 



00- 



80. 

 60 



ao 



\ 



/ J- /O /5 AO 2.5 



Number oj TriA)& 



FIG. 5. Complete Eecord Curves for Mice in the Multiple Choice Test, 

 showing curves based upon the average and the median for each day. (The 

 limits of the probable error for the average curve are indicated by the broken 

 lines.) 



in the multiple choice test is much shorter than in the maze test, and 

 the intensity of punishment is greater in the former case because 

 there the electric shock was used. Also color clews, and the fact that 

 it was necessary for the animal to go through only one door, tend 

 to lessen the average time in the multiple choice test. As indicated 

 in the previous discussion, there was no doubt a transfer effect in 

 learning from the first task to the second, that would again result 

 in shortening the time in the multiple choice test. This was due; 

 first, to a better general adaptation to the experiment as a whole, 

 which was carried over from the maze test ; and secondly, to the fact 

 that an important element was common to both tasks, namely, that 

 in each case the animal learned to escape from confinement by means 

 of a door that could be pushed open. It is interesting to note at this 

 point that Yerkes in his study of the dancing mouse 1 (see page 263) 

 found that experience in one labyrinth made the learning in a second 

 labyrinth much easier. "Those individuals whose first labyrinth 

 training was in (labyrinth) C made their first correct trip as the 

 result of 19.7 trials, whereas those which had previously been trained 

 in labyrinth B were able to make a correct trip as the result of only 

 7.0 trials. Similarly the table shows that training in C rendered the 

 10 This point is being more closely studied in an experiment, now under way. 



