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Provinces covered by the enquiry and selected from the North, Centre and South of Italy -27.
Answers returned — 25,042.
Answers discarded as being negative replies from children, who are not in the habit of visiting the cinema — 5,381 .
Answers eliminated because they give no exact reply to the questions asked — 3,931 .
Answers wholly or partly positive, or anyhow useful for the purpose of the enquiry 15,730.
Accordingly the replies deserving study included 1 5,730 boys and girls between the ages of fifteen and twenty-one, belonging to 742 different schools (elementary, secondary' high schools, technical schools and vocational classes) and taken from a total urban and rural population of more than twelve millions, and comprising every possible degree of intellectual development.
Mr. Wilson's enquiry was directed towards ascertaining the impressions made upon children by six groups of films numbering altogether twenty-one. It was therefore very difficult for the spectator to form any original, or more or less original, idea of war as a social and biological phenomenon, a factor of undoubted importance in the world's history, and on that very account necessitating the fullest possible freedom on the part of the children to express their own opinions.
To restrict the young people to a number of specific films is a\ the same time a good thing, and a bad thing. It is good if the enquiry, as in the case of Mrs. Mary Alten. Abbott's " Thief of Bagdad ", aims at ascertaining the particular impressions, or ideas suggested by the film in question and not at achieving any definite results. Its, however, a bad thing if the enquiry is used as a basis of generalisations. A film may, or may not, be technically and artistically ecellent and may for these, or other reasons, make different impressions of a purely subjective value. The film may be tolerated, enjoyed and appreciated in very different degrees. The subjects of the exmination may have seen other films, even films of the same kind, which may have had quite contrary effects upon their minds. Thus an enquiry whicn is limited to a specific group of films cannot be called complete.
The Institute's question No. 21 was very simple, as it only enquired of children " What do you think of war films ? " " What thoughts and feelings do they stir in you ?
The children were therefore free to answer as they wished, and the enquiry left room for every kind of war film — documentary, historical, dramatic or purely entertainment films. The child, whether he had seen one or a hundred different films, was asked to record his individual impressions.
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During the process of analysing the replies friends and collaborators of the Institute, who as suchha d ample opportunity of checking our methods of work, raised certain objections to which we should like to reply briefly :