Unconscious Bias in Walking.

Manawatu Standard, Volume IV, Issue 252, 20 September 1884, Page 5 (Supplement)

Unconscious Bias m Walking.

Nature prints the following interesting communication from G. H. Darwin :—'•'' " Some ten or twelve years ago I made some experiments upon the subject of Mr. Lar den's letters m Nature (January 17th, p. 262), namely, ' Unconscious Bias m Walking.' The experiments were not numerous, but they left no doubt m my mind as to the cause of divergence from a straight path. My notes were sent, at my father's suggestion, to the late Douglas Spalding, who was about to undertake experiments on the curious. power which animals have of finding their way. I rather think he made some trials with pigs, but I believe he never published anything on the subject. In stating my results lam compelled, therefore, to rely on memory only. " I began with walking myself, and getting , various friends to walk, with eyes shut, ;in a grass field. We all walked with amazing crookedness m paths whioh were not far re- j moved from circles. I myself and Mr. Galton, on the first trial described circles of not more than 1 fifty yards m diameter, -although -toe' thought we were going straight, and afterwards I was generally unable to impose a sufficiently strong conscious bias m one direction to annul the unconscious bias m the other. I believe we all diverged to the righfy excepting one of us, who was strongly left l-

-handed. " I then got eight village sohooiboys, from ten to twelve years of age, and offered a shilling to the boy who should walk straightest blindfold. Before the contest, however, I dusted some sawdust on the ground, and after making each of the boys walk over it, measured their strides from right to left and left to right. They were also made to hop, and the foot on whioh they hopped was noted ; they were then made to jump over a stick, and the foot from which they sprang was entered ; lastly, they were instructed to throw a stone, and the hand with whioh they threw was noted. Eaoh of these teats>a3 applied *—'— ovsr * — '■ — •■""'' ■ uuey were all right-handed m throwing a stone, but I believe that two of them exhibited some mark of being partly left-handed. The six who were totally righthanded strode longer from left to right than from right to left, hopped on the left leg, and rose m jumping from that leg. One boy pursued the opposite course, and the last walked irregularly, but with no average difference between his strides. When told to hop he' hopped on one leg, and m repetition on the other, and I could not clearly make up my mind which he used most m jumping. When I took them into the field, I made the boys successively take a good look at a stiqk at about forty yards distance, and then blindfolded them and started them to walk, guiding them Btraight for the first three or four paces. The result was that the left-legged boys all diverged to the right, the right-legged boys diverged to the left, and the one ;who would not reveal himself won the prize. jT-he; trial was repeated the second time |with closely similar results, although the prizewinner did not walk nearly so Btraight on the second trial. , : " I also measured the JBtrides of myself and of some of my friends, and found the dame connection between divergence and compara : tive length of stride. My own step from! left to right is about a quarter of an inch longer than from right to left, and I am strongly-right-handed. . ! " Comment on these experiments seems heedless, and they entirely confirm Mr. Larden m his view. " It seems to be generally held that rightleggedness is commoner than the reverse ; this I maintain to be incorrect. I believe that nine out of ten strongly right-handed persons are left-legged. Every active effort with the right hand is almost necessarily accompanied by an effort with the left leg, and a right-handed man is almost compelled to use his left leg' more than the other. I belfeve .thai: Sir Charle3 Bell considered that men were generally right-legged, and sought to derive the custom of mounting a horse from ■ the left side from the fact that the right leg is stronger than the other. I suggest as almost certain that we mount on that side because the long sword is necessarily worn on the left, and would get between our legs if we went to the offside of the horse. Some of your readers may perhaps be able to tell, us whether the Chinese do not wear their short swords on the right'and mount. their horaea from the right. : - - " I will not hazard a conjeoture as to why the rule of the road m Great Britian and inside of the towns of Florence and of Salzburg (?) is different from that adopted by the rest of the world. For an armed horseman the English rule is, I presume, more advantageous both for attack and defenoe." ■ ■

It is proposed m England to erect a memorial to Charles Dickens, taking the shape of a hospital for children, the institution to ibe called "Tiny Tim's Hospital for Crippled Children." : . •: :