58 JOHN B. WATSON 



of the " dissatisfaction" it brings could be stated somewhat as 

 follows: The getting of the food produces metabolism, increased 

 circulation, changes the tone of the organism, supplies nutrition 

 to the blood stream, etc. Now the whole system of neuro-mus- 

 cular arcs exercised throughout the solving of the problem does 

 not share equally in this bettered condition of the organism. The 

 particular arc last functional (the one employed in the successful 

 act) by reason of the fact that 'activity in it has not completely 

 died down' will reap the greatest benefit from the bettered func- 

 tional condition of the organism. .This in the long run would 

 tend to favor the successful arc at every trial. I do not mean 

 to say that any of them would state it in just this way. As a 

 matter of fact none of them has ever given even a fair presenta- 

 tion of just what they do mean. Swift has given the nearest 

 approximation to this statement. Thorndike has advocated the 

 satisfaction and dissatisfaction theory most consistently but he 

 has not attempted to give even a crude physiological basis for 

 his views. 



While I have no solution to offer I cannot help but see in the 

 experiment which I have just reported a serious objection to any 

 such formulation. I think we may assume without exaggeration 

 that there are from ten to fifteen complex acts performed during 

 the thirty seconds delay. All of these acts come after the so- 

 called successful act, i.e., the scratching away of the sawdust at 

 the proper place and the entering of b. As an interesting specu- 

 lative point one should consider the average total time of the 

 solving of the problem. After the fourth trial the average time 

 drops below thirty seconds. Thus from the fourth trial on 

 more useless movements occur in any given trial after the problem 

 has been solved than occur prior to the actual solution of the problem! 

 Why should not the neuro-muscular arcs used in executing these 

 later random movements be the ones to share in the bettered 

 physiological condition of the organism? 



I offer this experiment not as throwing any conclusive light 

 on the learning process but as opening up the possibility of carry- 

 ing out experimental work upon the fixation of arcs in habit and 

 as showing the very great need there is for such study. The 



