ke of monotony in their work. Whether
this theoretical view is correct, we have to determine by future
studies. In our Harvard laboratory we have now proceeded from such
preparatory mass experiments to subtle investigations on a small
number of persons well trained in psychological self-observation with
whom the conditions of the experiment can be varied in many
directions.[39]

It would seem probable that such experiments might also win
psychotechnical significance. A short series of tests which would have
to be adapted to the special situations, and which for the simple
wage-earner would have to be much easier than those sketched above,
would allow it to be determined beforehand whether an individual will
suffer from repetition in work. Even if we abstract from arguments of
social reform and consider exclusively the economic significance, it
must seem important that labor which involves much repetition be
performed by men and women whose mental dispositions favor an easy
grasp of successive uniform impressions. Experimentation could secure
the selection of the fit workmen and the complaint of monotony would
disappear. The same selection could be useful in the opposite
direction, as many economic occupations, especially in our time of
automatic machines, demand a quick and often rhythmical transition
from one activity to another. It is evident that those whose natural
dispositions make every mental excitement a preparation not for the
identical but for the contrasting stimulation will be naturally
equipped for this kind of economic tasks.

XVII

ATTENTION AND FATIGUE

The problem of monotony may lead us on to other conditions through
which attention is hindered and the product of labor thereby
decreased. The psychologist naturally first thinks of external
distractions of attention. If he turns to practical studies of the
actual economic life, he is often decidedly surprised to find how
little regard is given to this psychophysical factor. In industrial
establishments in which the smallest disturbance in the machine is at
once remedied by a mechanic in order that the greatest possible
economic effect may be secured, frequently nobody takes any interest
in the most destructive disturbances which unnecessarily occur in the
subtlest part of the factory mechanism, namely, the attention
apparatus of the laborers. Such an interference with attention must,
for instance, be recognized when the workingman, instead