The Analogies test is also a very entertaining type of parlour amusement, especially when some of the absurd answers are read aloud for the amusement of the group. When it is so used, however, no suggestion should be made of the relation between ability in this test and general intellectual quickness, lest someone should take offence. If the test is given without the exact and formal directions, and if the spirit of fun is introduced by the examiner, certain clever persons are quite certain to write words which have very amusing associations with the words which serve to set the problems in the various lines.
Directions for Giving the Test.
All candidates should be furnished with pencils and writing surfaces—either tables, chair-arms, or writing boards. One test booklet should be supplied to each candidate, the blank being presented unopened and with the title page up. The examiner should announce clearly as the papers are distributed that, “The booklets are not to be turned over or opened up until the signal is given to do so.” Candidates should also be directed to sign their names, ages, group numbers, and locations on the blank spaces provided on the cover of the booklet for this information. When each candidate has properly filled out the information blanks on the outside of the test booklet the examiner should speak as follows:
“This test is to find out how carefully and how rapidly you can think about the relations of words and of the things for which these words stand. Now look at your papers and read silently the directions, while I read them aloud.
“When you are told to open your booklets, you will find on the inside thirty lines of words—three words and a blank space being printed on each line. In each of these lines, the first two words are related to each other in a certain way which you are to study out. You are then to write, in the blank space at the end, a fourth word which has the same relation to the third word as the second word has to the first.
“Look, for example, at the first sample, in which the second word is the plural of the first. Boxes means more than one Box, so the fourth word should be Cats, meaning more than one Cat.
| Write a fourth word which fits the third in the same way the second word fits the first. | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st Sample: | BOX | Boxes | CAT | ........ |
| 2nd Sample: | DOWN | Up | IN | ........ |
| 3rd Sample: | EYES | See | EARS | ........ |
“In the second sample, the fourth word should be Out, because Up is the opposite of Down, and Out is the opposite of In.
“In the third sample, the fourth word should be Hear, for See tells what Eyes are used for, and Hear tells for what Ears are used.
“You will have three minutes in which to write the fourth word in the thirty lines on the next pages. Work as rapidly as you can without making mistakes. Be sure to stop as soon as I call ‘Time up.’ Now turn your papers and begin.”