Psychological Bulletin

Travers, Robert M. W.

doi: 10.1037/h0055263pmid: 14808484

Examination of the technique as employed in the Officer Efficiency Report indicates that the rater has to make judgments "which are strictly illogical. These defects in the technique are not, however, basic and can be remedied. An examination of the validation studies . . . reveals that the evidence does not support some of the claims made for the validity of these procedures . . . there seems little to choose between forced-choice and traditional rating. The high validity coefficients secured . . . must be considered to be largely spurious until they are demonstrated to be otherwise . . . . Proper studies need to be made to determine the validity of scales in this area constructed on the basis of an adequate rationale."

Boyd, William C.

doi: 10.1037/h0057150pmid: 14808485

Sundry comments are made on a paper by Cohen and Ogden (see ^W24:^n 3544). Other papers on the subject are reviewed. It is concluded that, " . . . statistically significant differences exist in some populations between the percentages of the two sexes which are able to taste (PTC) as bitter, and that significant racial differences exist. Some of the problems of testing have been discussed. The fact that certain other compounds somewhat similar in structure to PTC are tasted as bitter by the same persons is discussed, and results with several new substances are mentioned."

Bitterman, M. E.

doi: 10.1037/h0050357pmid: 14808486

Comments on a review by H. M. Johnson (Psychol. Bull., 1950, 47, 174-177) of the book "Work and Effort: The Psychology of Production" by T. A. Ryan . To anyone who has studied Ryan's penetrating analysis of the problems of fatigue and efficiency, the commentator's review of the book must come as a distinct surprise. There is little apparent relation between the book which Johnson describes and the book which Ryan has written. Ryan's principal thesis is that fatigue and efficiency cannot be satisfactorily evaluated in terms of performance measures alone. Performance, Ryan argues, can be affected not only by the adequacy of working conditions, but also by the effort which the worker devotes to his task.

Johnson, H. M.

doi: 10.1037/h0051828pmid: 14808487

Replies to the comments made by M. E. Bitterman regarding the present author's review (Psychol. Bull., 1950, 47, 174-177) of "Work and Effort" by Thomas A. Ryan. He refutes that he did not say, nor imply, nor even insinuate, that Ryan had undertaken to analyze non-Poissonian distributions into Poissonian components, in the hope of getting generally useful results. His comment is said to have been obiter, but relevant to some attempts that have been made and published recently.

Creegan, Robert F.

doi: 10.1037/h0052596pmid: 14808488

Comments on a review by C.M. Louttit (Psychol. Bull, 1950, 47, 170-171) of the book by Donald Snygg and Arthur W. Combs . While this author agrees with several points made by the reviewer, he is very much puzzled, however, by Professor Louttit's apparent assertion that the phenomenological concept violates the law of parsimony in psychology. Louttit's argument is that "if the phenomenal field can only be inferred from past behavior, it hardly seems necessary to introduce the entity at all." We may agree that prediction concerns relationships between past behavioral data and future behavioral data. Yet it seems necessary to note a fact which really should be obvious. The data do not themselves predict anything.

Burke, C. J.

doi: 10.1037/h0051660pmid: 14808489

Replies to the comments made by Charles C. Peters on the original article ("The Use and Misuse of the Chi-square Test," . In the commentator's published criticism of our original paper, the footnote in question was omitted, with the consequence that our remark is left dangling. Further consequences are that our reply to Peters' point 3 on pp. 333-334 of his article is inadequate, since this reply was based upon the missing footnote. The omitted footnote is crucial for our reply and serves better than anything we could write to illustrate Peters' confusions with respect to the chi-square test.

Lanier, Lyle H.

doi: 10.1037/h0049567pmid: N/A

Reviews the book Applied Experimental Psychology by A. Chapanis, W. R. Garner and C. T. Morgan . This is the first systematic text dealing with the relations between psychology and engineering-with problems of designing machines so that they are adapted to the characteristics of human beings. It is an important book because it defines the boundaries of this new field and indicates the problems that confront the psychologist who chooses to work in it. After the introduction, the reader encounters two chapters on elementary statistics with illustrations chosen from problems of designing machines to suit human characteristics. The next six chapters deal with visual and auditory perception and with the applications of perceptual data to problems of designing devices for "displaying" information to the human senses. Two more chapters are devoted to the nature of motor skills and to the related problem of designing controls that are adapted to human motor abilities. The last three chapters deal with the arrangement of tools, equipment, and the work place, with work and fatigue, and with the working environment.

Lanier, Lyle H.

doi: 10.1037/h0049473pmid: N/A

Reviews the book Personal adjustment in old age by Ruth S. Cavan et al . This monograph has three purposes: to define and to analyze the nature, patterns, and problems of personal adjustment to aging; to present the available facts about old age derived from census data and from a special survey of 2,988 older persons made by the authors; and to describe two instruments for measuring adjustment in later maturity. It contains a thoughtful discussion of definitions of aging, of the cultural patterns of old age groups, and of old age adjustment; provides a compact source for census information describing groups past sixty; and presents a number of excellent sketches of old people and their modes of adjustment. This monograph is stimulating and useful in courses dealing with the psychology of maturity and old age. It is especially rich in research suggestions, both explicitly stated and implicit in the discussion and findings, in particular in the interrelations among sub-sections of the inventory.