Psychologists at Cornell

The most tremendous burden which an aging person must carry, thinks Dr. Walter Richard Miles of Stanford University, is "the feeling of inferiority and insecurity due to the decrease in physical strength and energy." But such burden is unnecessary. To showing why, Dr. Miles devoted his presidential address before the American Psychological Association at Ithaca, N. Y. last week. For one thing, the latter half of human life has been "scientifically neglected. Psychologists have exhibited great interest in the first two and a half decades of life. But this still leaves five or six decades of human adult life relatively untouched. Maturity, later maturity and senescence are still in the realm for folklore, anecdote and personal impression."

Dr. Miles directed investigations testing 863 people whose ages ranged from 6 to 95. More than half were over 50. Results:

For jobs which require keen eyesight the best group was between 30 and 49 years of age. They average 93% as good as the best individuals in Dr. Miles's whole group. The 50 to 69 group averaged 76% as good as the best.

Hands and feet slow up as people age, but by no means so much as is usually believed.

Memory declines with age. Imagination, once good, stays good. Judgment im proves.

Other observations reported at the A. P. A. meeting:

P:Cocktails make the mouth water -- until the alcohol gets into the blood. Then the saliva tends to cease flowing and the parched throat craves another drink. Whatever good effect the cocktails have as appetizers, the good must soon be lost. For as soon as the blood absorbs the alcohol, digestion is retarded. -- Dr. Andrew Leon Winsor, Cornell University.

P:Marriage seems to be no sedative for neurotics. Married couples are distinctly more "nervous" than university undergraduates. A first baby calms the husband, excites the wife. Couples with three or more children are better balanced than couples with less children.--Dr. Raymond Royce Willoughby, Clark University.

Single women reach the peak of neuroticism between 30 and 35. Commented Dr. Wrilloughby facetiously: "Maybe they've given up hope by that time."

P:For the first time some one thought how to prove that sparing the rod might harm the child. Students need the in centive of punishment if they are to learn anything quickly.--Drs. Leland Whitney Crafts & Ralph Wesley Gilbert of New York University shocked students with electricity every time they made an error in simple mechanical problems. Not only did the shocked students learn the problems more quickly than did undisturbed students, they remembered their lessons better.

P:Tall drivers of motor cars take more time to park than do short drivers. Women require more than twice as long to park their cars as do men (a sex difference). Safest drivers are men around 60.--Dr. Alvahh R. Lauer, Iowa State College.

P:When caged monkeys are angered or frightened they leap to sexual activity. But monkeys at large relieve their emotion by running away or by other physical activity. This suggests that in monkeys, and probably in humans, sex is not the primal urge which Freudians make it out to be.--Dr. Otto Leif Tinklepaugh, Yale Anthropoid Experiment Station, Orange Park, Fla.

P:New A. P. A. president is Louis Leon Thurstone, 45, a Cornell mechanical engineer, who became a University of Chicago professor of psychology. A "perfect scientist" is Professor Thurstone, who works as precisely as he speaks, who throws data on which he has been working for months into the waste basket if it seems to him inaccurate or meaningless. His students like him for being a thoroughgoing introvert, a type of individual whom psychologists like to discuss. In psychology he is noted for his application of engineering gear & technique to psychological investigations. The "Thurstone Personality Schedule" is a much used gauge. His "attitude tests" are standard means of learning the effectiveness of propaganda, publicity, any form of persuasiveness. To make psychology an exact science commensurable with older sciences is his whole aim. To the U. S. professoriate he is marked as the man who last year suggested that the American Association of University Professors should rate colleges according to their scholastic standing, freedom of teaching, security of job tenure. Professor Thurstone's sug gestion was heard coldly. During Chicago's winters he wears spats to protect his legs from snowdrifts. He also affects a drum-shaped fur hunting cap with fur flaps for blustery weather. He requires their protection for his winglike ears.

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