Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 51.djvu/813

Rh psychology. The former is, of course, in Prof. Donaldson's hands. The department is equipped with all the necessary illustrative apparatus—diagrams, models, etc.; the laboratory is supplied with needed material and appliances. The courses offered are intended (a) to furnish an exposition of the architecture and functions of the nervous system; and (b) to offer opportunity for the investigation of new problems and critical discussion of current work in the subject. In the outline of courses reference is had to the importance of the anatomy and physiology of the nervous system to the student of medicine. Special study is attempted of the variations in intelligence correlated with the changes in the central nervous system (1) in the vertebrate series, (2) during the growth and development of any individual, and (3) as the consequence of disease or experimental injury; such variations have an importance which is psychological as well as biological. The study of the nervous system is capable of throwing light upon some of the questions of phylogeny, and emphasis is laid upon this fact.

Experimental psychology, which has assumed recently great prominence in the universities, is here in charge of Prof. James R. Angell. Two chief ideas are held constantly in view in the work: (a) to give thorough practical training for the carrying on of experimental investigation; (b) to directly conduct such investigation. The instrumental equipment is adequate, placing the university among the first half dozen in America. The new quarters in the Anatomical Laboratory furnish ample space for laboratory work, apparatus rooms, and lecturing. The relation between this work under Prof. Angell and neurology under Prof. Donaldson is naturally close, and the two work in harmony. In psychology proper no work in nervous anatomy is undertaken, but students are impressed with its importance and urged to pursue it in the other department. The nominal relation of the work is with the Department of Philosophy, and some of the results of research have appeared in the publication of the university entitled Contributions to Philosophy. The first number of this publication is, in fact, devoted to psychology. Among its contents the paper on Reaction Times is fundamental and perhaps the most thoroughgoing statement yet made in this direction, so far as the processes themselves are concerned. Much attention has been given to memory processes, especially the visual and auditory elements of such processes. The work upon simultaneous sensations—visual, auditory, tactile, electric—is perhaps the most careful yet made. The study of the psychology of attention has been much emphasized during the past year. An investigation, the results of which are just about to be published, upon the growth of habit is among the first on this subject to be pursued from the primarily experimental point.