Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 79.djvu/87

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PSYCHOLOGY OF MENTAL DEFICIENCY
83

Fig. 1. A Corner of the Psychological Laboratory where Dr. Goddard conducts his Experiments. There are shown an ergograph, a chronoscope, which measures intervals of time to one thousandth of a second, a dark room for photographic work, an automotograph for recording involuntary movements of hand and arm, a target for testing precision in motor control, etc.

was from one of Itard's pupils, Seguin, who, in 1846, published his valuable work on the physiological treatment of mental defectives. About the middle of the last century, institutions for the care of defectives began to be organized throughout the world, and in 1904 Germany had 24, Sweden 33, England 12 and the United States 30 such homes. At the present time twenty-six of our states have a sum total of 25,000 children in institutions for feeble minded. The Vineland institution, in New Jersey, is one of the most progressive, and the psychological movement for which it stands is rapidly growing in importance and has many followers throughout this country and in some sections of Europe and Canada.

The best studies of the mentally feeble and defective have been made by Itard, Seguin, Howe, Powell, Ireland, Shuttleworth, Tredgold and Barr; among the psychologists who are formulating and trying out individual tests and finding methods of making mental diagnoses are Binet, Simon, De Sanctis, Meumann, Stern, Norsworthy, Thorndike, Goddard, Witmer, Huey, Whipple, MacMillan, Wallin and others; among physicians working in this field are Krenberger, Fernald, Wylie and Healy. One of the places where this study is being most successfully carried out is at Vineland, which has exceptional opportunities for research work because the institution is under private management as well as under state patronage, and it was here a psychological laboratory was founded in 1906, which was the first to be