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ciple.  Moreover,  it  appeared  that  some  of  the  operators
had  been  working  at  dial  machines  for  periods  of  from  two
to  ten  years,  while  others  had  been  working  only  a  few
months.  Naturally,  the  old  workers  would  be  the  better
operators,  even  though  some  of  them  may  not  have  been
as  promising  as  some  of  the  newer  girls  who  had  not  yet
had  much  experience.  All  these  factors  entered  into  the
situation,  and  still  there  was  a  consistent  correlation.
These  correlations  were  high  enough  to  permit  the  separation ­
  of  all  operators  into  two  classes,  the  fast  and  the  slow
operators,  and  this  classification  suggested  the  basis
on  which  applicants  could  in  the  future  be  assigned  to
fast  or  slow  machines.
That  this  test  distinguished  between  slow  and  fast  operators ­
  was  still  further  borne  out  by  the  fact  that  two  of
the  four  shops  mentioned  contained  slow  operators,  who
did  correspondingly  slow  work  in  the  tests.  One  shop
had  slow  machines  while  the  night  shift  of  the  other  shop
had  very  slow  operators.  Correspondingly,  the  average
performance  of  the  night  shift  in  the  test  was  between
twenty-five  and  thirty  per  cent  poorer  than  that  of  the
day  shift  which  was  made  up  of  fast  workers.
To  check  the  results  still  further,  the  test  was  given  to
sixteen  applicants  chosen  at  random  from  the  employment ­
  office.  Only  three  of  the  sixteen  attained  the  average ­
  made  by  the  operators  in  one  of  the  shops,  thus  tending ­
  to  confirm  the  statement  made  by  the  foreman  of  this
shop  that  seven  out  of  every  ten  girls  sent  in  for  this  work
failed  to  make  good.
Besides  the  test  already  described,  the  Scott  three-hole
test  was  given.  This  test  consists  of  a  board  set  at  an
angle  of  45°  with  three  holes  six  inches  apart  forming  an
equilateral  triangle.  The  task  of  the  subject  is  to  push