International projectionist (Nov-Dec 1933)

December 1933 INTERNATIONAL PROJECTIONIST 33 on both in the laboratory and under regular theatrical conditions. Children and adults were used, boys and men, girls and women. Some six thousand four hundred readings were made with a psychogalvanometer, two thousand one hundred fifty of them in the movie theatre. Heart-beat was also counted by appropriate mechanical devices. What was learned? Briefly, that in the case of slapstick stuff, adolescents are roughly under twice as much emotional intensity as adults; and young children, between six and eleven years, three times as much. No horror or mystery pictures were used in the experiment, yet, in certain scenes, young children registered from eight to ten times the emotional intensity of the adults. The adult has had experience that enables him to say to himself, "That isn't real; that isn't true." To the child, what he sees is both real and true. In the cases of love scenes and those of suggestive sex, children nine years of age appeared to react with about the same intensiveness as adults. From twelve to fifteen, all children reacted to a still greater degree. During the years following puberty — sixteen to eighteen years of age — the emotional stresses caused by sex pictures are at their maximum— twice as great as is experienced by adults. And that is considerable. The rate of heart beat was found to be profoundly affected. The experimenters did not venture to use pictures of horror or mystery in any of their experiments with children — only those of quite common variety. Yet, in watching these, the heart beat ran up repeatedly from a normal of 75 or 80 to 125 and 140. Using The Mysterious Dr. Fu Manchu, the heart beat of a mature woman, selected for her normal and equable temperament, jumped up frequently to 150 and 168 and on single occasions to 180 and 192. Sleep Disturbance Studies Study of sleep disturbance was also made throughout a two and one-half year period, during which the sleep motility of 170 boys and girls from six to eighteen years of age was observed. Twenty experimental beds were electrically equipped so that every movement was recorded in a distant room on revolving drums of paper. These beds were occupied on 347 nights — a total of 6,650 child-nights of sleep — that is, for 59.580 hours. The records of movements during every minute of that time were carefully studied. It was found that after attending the "mine run" of movies at a neighboring theatre, so situated that the cliildren could be home and in bed by nine o'clock, the average restlessness of girls was increased 14 per cent and that of boys 26 per cent. This restlessness continued for several nights before normal sleep was restored. No mystery or horror pictures were seen during the sleep study. But numerous instances are recorded by other observers in which such films resulted in broken sleep and fright ful nightmares for weeks and even months. There were, as you see, three separate and distinct tests of emotional stresses experienced by children. There were direct objective measurement by means of the psychogalvanometer; indirect objective measurement by observation of the heart-beat; objective measurement of resulting sleep disturbance by the electric hypnograph. These, both separately and collectively, indicate the presence in children of states of high emotional excitement as the result of movie attendance. (4) Attitude Studies. — These had to do with the effectiveness of motion pictures as an instrument for changing the social attitudes of children in either socially approved or socially disapproved directions. An attitude is a habitual, or relatively fixed, emotional response to a given idea or situation. It was found that with a single film the attitude could be changed much as the line of mer SUN ARC CARBONS Best by Test Used in Radio City by the World'6 largest theatres — RKO Music Hall RKO Roxy Samples on Request CARBON PRODUCTS, Inc. 324 West 42nd Street New York, N. Y. Clayton Even Tension • All projectors in Radio City theatres and projection rooms are equipped with Clayton Even-Tension Take-ups. Radio City thus confirms lake Up S the judgment of thousands of theatres — the largest and the smallest — throughout the world which found the Clayton to be the perfect take-up. No springs — no adjustments to make. Write for catalog of Clayton aids to good projection and sound reproduction. CLAYTON PRODUCTS CO. 31-45 TIBBETT AVENUE NEW YORK, N. Y. How Many? Was this copy dog-eared when it came to you? How many men read it ahead of you? You would receive a clean, fresh copy if you had a personal subscription — and you wouldn't have to wait — you would be first to read it. INTERNATIONAL PROJECTIONIST, 580 Fifth Ave., New York, N. Y. □ 1 year— 12 issues— $2.00 □ 2 years— 24 issues — $3.00 Enter my subscription for Name Address City . . . Local . . State