No two foreign symbols of a series and no two terms of a couplet contained the same sounded vowel in accented syllables.
The rule for the avoidance of alliteration, rhyme, and assonance was extended to the foreign symbols, and to the two terms of a couplet.
The English pronounciation was used in the nonsense words. The subjects were not informed what the nonsense words were. They were called foreign words.
Free body movements were used in the movement series as in the A set. Rarely an object was involved, e.g., the table on which the subject wrote. The movements were demonstrated to the subject in advance of learning, as in the A set.
The following are typical B series:
| B2. Nonsense words and objects. | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| quar | rudv | xem | lihkez |
| lid | cent | starch | thorn |
| B3. Nonsense words and verbs. | |||
| dalbva | fomso | bloi | kyvi |
| poke | limp | hug | eat |
| B4. Nonsense words and movements. | |||
| ohv | wecolu | uxpa | haymj |
| gnash | cross | frown | twist |
The time conditions for presenting a series remained practically the same. In learning, the series was shown three times as before. The interval between learning and testing was shortened to 4 seconds, and in the test the post-term interval of A13-16 retained (6 secs.). This allowed the subject 9 secs. for recalling and writing each term. The only important change was an extension of the number of tests from two to four. The third test was one week after the second, and the fourth one week after the third. In these tests the familiar word was always the term required, as in A1-4, on account of the difficulty of dealing statistically with the nonsense words. The intervals for testing permanence in the B set may be most easily understood by giving the time record of one subject.
| TIME RECORD OF Hu. | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Series. | Im. Rec. | Two Days. | Nine Days. | Sixteen Days. |
| B1-4 | Feb. 12 | Feb. 14 | Feb. 21 | Feb. 28 |
| B5-8 | Feb. 19 | Feb. 21 | Feb. 28 | Mch. 7 |
| B9-12 | Feb. 26 | Feb. 28 | Mch. 7 | Mch. 14 |
| B13-16 | Mch. 5 | Mch. 7 | Mch. 14 | Mch. 21 |
The two half-hours in a week during which all the work of one subject was done fell on approximately the same part of the day. When a number of groups of 4 series each were to be tested on a given day they were taken in the order of their recency of learning. Thus on March 7 the order for Hu was B13-16, B9-12, B5-8.
Henceforth there was also rotation within a given four series. As there were always sixteen series in a set, the effects of practice and fatigue within a given half-hour were thus eliminated.