the fault, or at least not without the fault, of the motormen
in street railway transportation have always aroused disquietude and
even indignation in the public, and the street railway companies
suffered much from the many payments of indemnity imposed by the court
as they amounted to thirteen per cent of the gross earnings of some
companies. Last winter the American Association for Labor Legislation
called a meeting of vocational specialists to discuss the problem of
these accidents under various aspects. The street railways of various
cities were represented, and economic, physiological, and
psychological specialists took part in the general discussion. Much
attention was given, of course, to the questions of fatigue and to the
statistical results as to the number of accidents and their relation
to the various hours of the day and to the time of labor. But there
was a strong tendency to recognize as still more important than the
mere fatigue, the whole mental constitution of the motormen. The
ability to keep attention constant, to resist distraction by chance
happenings on the street and especially the always needed ability to
foresee the possible movements of the pedestrians and vehicles were
acknowledged as extremely different from man to man. The companies
claimed that there are motormen who practically never have an
accident, because they feel beforehand even what the confused
pedestrian and the unskilled chauffeur will do, while others
relatively often experience accidents of all kinds because they do not
foresee how matters will develop. They can hardly be blamed, as they
were not careless, and yet the accidents did result from their
personal qualities; they simply lacked the gift of instinctive
foresight. All this turned the attention more and more to the
possibilities of psychological analysis, and the Association suggested
that I undertake an inquiry into this interesting problem with the
means of the psychological laboratory. I felt the practical importance
of the problem, considering that there are electric railway companies
in this country which have up to fifty thousand accident indemnity
cases a year. It therefore seemed to me decidedly worth while to
undertake a laboratory investigation.

It would have been quite possible to treat the functions of the
motormen according to the method which resolves the complex
achievement into its various elements and tests every function
independently. For instance,