GENIUS TESTS

Evening Star, Issue 21994, 2 April 1935, Page 12

GENIUS TESTS

ENGLISH EXPERIMENT Every morning, insignificant and unimportant among the tens of thousands of others who are doing exactly the same thing at exactly the same time, a man I know travels by an underground tube from a London suburb to the city,_wntes D r Haydn Brown, one of England s leading* psychologists, in the ‘ Sunday Chronicle. Seven or eight hours pass slowly by as he sits behind a desk and pushes a Every evening he catches the tube train again . . . and back home to spend the evening Quietly with ms wife and family. A clerk ?• No. The man is a genius. By profession a clert, yes. But by natural ability and inclination a great scientist. He goes on clerking, satisfied and undisturbed.

Another case . . • ■ . A man of twenty-seven was running a chicken farm. He was overwhelmed by unhappiness and discontent. He resented the job and everything about it. But all the time uncalled upon to display his real talent in public, he was exercising it in private. Actually, the man is a born writer. Before the year is out he will have made his name in literature. , HATED HIS JOB. Let me explain these two cases. How their lost talent was discovered, what has happened to them now. First, the clerk-scientist. There is no doubt that he is aware of his phenomenal ability. But he suffers from the handicap of most geniuses —a strange modesty, a natural reticence. He is consumed with the sensation of enjoying science for its own sake._ that is as far as he has got. Ho is still one of the tens of thousands of city clerks. Perhaps he always will be. ' The second case—the writer—is in a different category. He came to see me a few weeks ago. He was in a terrible state—so mentally burdened that he paced anxiously up and down my consulting room absolutely distraught and downright unhappy. ; _ After a talk lasting several hours I succeeded in reaching his inmost mind. The trouble was the chicken farm—the job he hated. I soon realised that by instinct the man was a writer. He was, too, an extensive reader. He was more concerned with the Shakespeare ■ he knew from end to end than with chickens. .

Rather shamefacedly he told me that he had written poems; I read them—beautiful specimens of sonnet writing, as entrancing as anything that has ever been written. A play, too, he had written; a work that proved to be astonishingly good on being read by an expert on drama. Our intimate talk enabled the chicken farmer to break down the wall of depression that was baffling and torturing him and to engage his mind in discussing frankly his real talent—writing. His name, of course, I cannot divulge. But soon, X feel sure, the whole nation will know it.

Such is the fickle thing called genius. For these cases are in no way exceptional. I know of many other similar instances.

One will recall the strange instance of the 24-year-old girl who doctors described as being of “ extremely low intelligence.” After treatment for acute anxietyhysteria she was found to have a brain equal to or even better than that of the average University professor. These cases, isolated, make us sit up and take notice, but actually, among the 49,000,000-odd people of Great Britain, there are hundreds of geniuses wasting away. Thousands whose real capabilities are never known to the world. Yet we are still posing that seemingly eternal question . . . The great ones are passing—who will take their places P Once it - was a futile question. But it is futile no longer. To-day it can be answered. There is no need now for talent and genius to remain untapped. Chance has stepped out of the game of life. Science has now taken its place. Any examination of the great careers and genius is bound to bring us to the classrooms of our schools. What does our system of education really do to tap the vast sources of ability that is inherent in every generation? Five years ago I set out to discover a remedy for what I knew then was the essental fault. I searched out a series of infallible tests that would achieve just what the average school Curriculum was obviously not achieveAnd I began my research on the mechanical devices that ultimately became known as the sensameter. I arrived at a number of startling conclusions. . This was the problem with which I confronted myself: Why is it that boys who have had little or no real early education often succeed in building up names for themselves that will find their place in history? Why is it that the schools do not reveal their genius? What is happening to the genius that is not even discovered in later life P.

Here are some of the examples of the cases I have considered?

’ The late Sir Robert M‘Alpine began his . own .efforts on leaving school at eight by working in a mine for a few shillings a week. . Probably his first real education began when, _ on his own initiative, he went to a night school, He became a wealthy, distinguished, and titled contractor, whose breadth of serviceable- operations became ultimately immense. ' Sir Stephen Killick, London’s new Lord Mayor, went to a night school and began life' at 5s a week. On the other hand, boys and young men who have passed examinations with the greatest ease and were educated at schools and universities until they could not possibly have any . more knowledge stuffed into their brains, have often proved utter failures in later life. Ordinary school work obviously will give no true indication of foundational intelligence except in exceptional circumstances. Darwin was a disappointing pupil. Winston Churchill, tool EXPERIMENTS SUCCEED, Some new method was vitally necessary by Which foundational ability could, be accurately estimated, and after, years of work , I have now. just succeeded in my experiments. A system was wanted which would serve to examine and_ classify mental powers; train the mind, as well as test it; quickly estimate a person’s suitability for a certain sphere. I studied the case of Miss Helen Keller. Born blind and deaf, she became in spite of her great handicap, highly educated through the sense of touch, This led me to the conviction that it must be through this sense of touch that the foundational intelligence of all human beings could be estimated. • The sensameter consists of a series of tests and puzzles made of metal pieces. To the candidate under examination certain problems are set, the majority, of which he must work out solely by the'sense of touch. Here are some typical tests: —The candidate is shown a piece of metal shaped like the top of a tin. Its surface is broken by a number of small, raised' portions, and when the disc is E laced under a piece of cloth, so. that e cannot use his eyes to assist him to a solution, the candidate is told to give the exact number of raised points. Another test:—vSix pieces of metal of the oddest; possible shapes (but not angular) are placed under the cloth. The candidate is shown a card on which there are exact tracings of the various metal pieces. He is told to ascertain, solely by .the sense of touch, whicn metal piece should go on each lar tracing, and to place the piece accordingly. For all such tests a tune limit is set. . , r When it became known that I was conducting such. experiments .the interests and assistance of educational authorities was soon forthcoming. An inquiry came to me from Colonel Loir tus, the distinguished head roaster ot Barking Abhey School. He wanted to investigate. He borrowed the outfit, and expressed a desire to test .it among some 400 pupils in his charge. He subsequently wrote that he would like to investigate, more fully, to if in practice the svstem wotud fulfil all that I claimed for it. and invited me to the school. ■ i ~ . Two boys, “A’’.and. B, well known to him but quite unknown to mo, were selected. They showed, slowness of application when they set about the tasks I put before them- -I was not surprised, for I had long known of the fervent cry ot. schoolmasters, “ If only we could get boys to .concentrate. . . .” The real reason for such lack of concentration is that fiom the beginning to the end of ,the educational years pupils learn to depend entirely on directions given. They get deeply accustomed to t doing as told, being- contented to wait for guidance. This was clearly shown by the boys I examined. ’ The slightest disturbance turned them from their task. - They sat on opposite sides of a small square table. I was on .a third side, and Colonel Loftus was near by. The eyes and ears of■ “ A ” wereTound to be more alert than those or li e. The attention was, therefore, more undividedly earned in A than in “ B.” “ A’s ” power of giving attention was' indicated by the more direct way he faced me when I spoke to him-. “ B ” listened with a slightly sideways face. " B ” twice instantly sought for a short cut in making efforts towards a solution of the puzzles. This indicated a tendency to be resourceful, but hot in the least dishonest. Both registered honestly. . - .. ■ “A” will be artistic, as his sight and hearing indicated, as well as mathematically straight. “ B ” will bo somewhat ingenious. A will have far more courage in facing people in ordinary life, but “B” will have good courage in necessarily difficult situations, perhaps more so than “ A.” As an example of what the system sets out to establish, here are my conclusions on these two cases :—" A ” should succeed in artistic or artisticbusiness life, and “ B ” in some business that attracted him,, or in law. These • particular tests were only a

demonstration, and not complete and final. They showed that’ it is by puzzles and tests, such as those I out* lined, that the art of concentration can be taught. In use they inculcate an infinite capacity for taking pains. Every one should know his " handicap ” —and the main fault is not always lack of concentration. It can be revealed by demeanour and questions asked while the puzzles are being solved. , . - -■ Not only children, hut adults, too,can be tested. It is only by such! .methods that we, can unearth talent that might otherwise go to seed, and ensure that the right men and women get the right jobs. , Officials of the General Post Office and the leaders of many large corporations have expressed interest in the svstem, for it is realised. that ability should no 1 longer be discovered od utilised merely by accident. The of the square peg in the round hole in the spheres of Business and industry, must pass. To-day we are groping with new methods of preventing such setbacks to progress. We are on the threshold of a revolution in educational methods.