Mental fatigue : a comprehensive exposition of the nature of mental fatigue, of the methods of its measurement and of their results, with special reference to the problems of instruction / by Max Offner ; translated from the German by Guy Montrose Whipple.

  • Offner, Max, 1864-1932.
Date:
1911
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Mental fatigue : a comprehensive exposition of the nature of mental fatigue, of the methods of its measurement and of their results, with special reference to the problems of instruction / by Max Offner ; translated from the German by Guy Montrose Whipple. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    INTRODU CTORY In no field of work has experimental psychology come into closer contact with tke practica! problems of instruction tlian in the investigation of fatigue. Complaints against the overburdening of school children have been current for a long time. Because the earlier discussions of the problem, which were based upon general observations without the assist- ance of exact methods, were inadequate to settle the pros and cons of the dispute, experimental Observa- tion has been applied to its solution. The first con- tribution of tliis sort appears to have been a research published by the Russian psychiatrist, J. Sikorski, in 1879. There have followed, from year to year, further studies, so that in the last 30 years an exten- sive literature of mental fatigue has accumulated. The very extent of this literature, and the difficulty of getting hold of it, and the fact that thus far the in- vestigations have not been brouglit to a perfectly satisfactory conclusion, may account for the circum- stance that schoolmen have not, as a rule, shown as much interest in them as they warrant, in spite of their rather modest results. Indeed, it is not unlikely that the results would today be in better shape, that we sliould have, by now, made better progress in our solution of this complex problem if the schoolmen