PART I.

ASSOCIATION IN NORMAL SUBJECTS.


Among the most striking and commonly observed manifestations of
insanity are certain disorders of the flow of utterance which appear
to be dependent upon a derangement of the psychical processes commonly
termed association of ideas. These disorders have to some extent been
made the subject of psychological experimentation, and the object of
this investigation is to continue and extend the study of these
phenomena by an application of the experimental method known as the
association test.



Sec. 1. METHOD OF INVESTIGATION.


In this investigation we have followed a modified form of the method
developed by Sommer,[1] the essential feature of which is the
statistical treatment of results obtained by uniform technique from a
large number of cases.

[Footnote 1: Diagnostik der Geisteskrankheiten, p. 112.]

The stimulus consists of a series of one hundred spoken words, to each
of which the subject is directed to react by the first word which it