The Influence of Muscular Tension on the Efficiency of Mental Work

Infant Sucking and Tensional Behavior

“…Instances of strong sucking pressure without sucking movements occur in breast Downloaded by [Indiana University Libraries] at 22:58 16 March 2015 and easy nipple feeding (see Figure 7). 7 In this connection some of Jensen's curves show this peculiarity.…”

“…It is generally held that muscular tension increases during mental work (7; 44), and that tension increases the efficiency in performance of mental tasks (7). However, Zartman and Cason (71) find that the relationship between muscular tension and mental efficiency appears to be negative and point out that several other investigators also disagree with the general rule.…”

Age Changes and Adaptability

“…There is clear evi dence that a moderate rise facilitates many types of performance, including learning (e.g. Bills, 1927;Stroud, 1931;Freeman, 1933;Brown, 1937;Stauffacher, 1937;Courts, 1939;Duffey, 1957;Malmo, 1957Malmo, , 1959. Severe rises, however, impair performance and reduce speed of learning, probably because over-activity in the brain produces "neural noise" which "blurs" signals and reduces "chan nel capacity".…”

The effects of induced muscle tension during tracking on level of activation and on performance.

“…In 1887, for example, Lombard (cited by Bills, 1927) found the knee jerk to be enhanced by mental effort, and Loeb reported that pressure on a dynamometer tends to slacken when accompanied by mental effort. Bills has also reviewed extensive etudies by Golla, in which it was shown that the tonicity of many muscles measured during mental work was invariabl y heightened.…”

“…Bills has also reviewed extensive etudies by Golla, in which it was shown that the tonicity of many muscles measured during mental work was invariabl y heightened. Bills (1927) was apparently the first to test the functional significance of experimentally induced muscle tension and psychological activity. In the first of a series of experimenta, he required his subjects to learn nonsense syllables while squeezing two hand dynamometers.…”