The kind of apparatus, the method to be employed and the place for the experiment are all matters that vary with the conditions of the special problem. The apparatus may be simple and easily devised, or it may be intricate and the result of years of investigation and a large expenditure of money.
If there seems to you to be anything impracticable in the employment of tests in the manner we have indicated, please remember that for many years those seeking employment as railroad
engineers have been required to pass tests for color-blindness, tests just as truly psychological as any that we have here referred to and differing from them only in respect to the character and complexity of the qualities tested.
Analysis of Different Callings
Every calling can be analyzed and the mental elements requisite for success in that particular line can be scientifically disentangled. Methods for testing the individual as to his possession of any one or all of the mental elements required in any given vocation may then be devised in the psychological laboratory.
Furthermore, definite and scientific exercises can be formulated whereby the individual may train and develop special senses, faculties and powers so
as the better to fit himself for his chosen field of work.
Exercises for Developing Special Faculties
The use of the experimental method is new to every department of science. Crude and occasional experiments have marked the advance of physics, physiology and chemistry, but it is only with the recent innovation of the scientific laboratory that these sciences have made their greatest strides.
The employment of this method in dealing with problems of the mind is particularly new. So far as we are aware there is no school in all the world that employs definite and scientific exercises in the discipline and training of its pupils in power of observation, imagination and memory.