This was finally and triumphantly
achieved by Charcot's school.
There is only one other point in the explanation of hysteria which I will
here refer to, and that because it is usually ignored, and because it has
relationship to the general psychology of the sexual emotions. I refer to
that physiological hysteria which is the normal counterpart of the
pathological hysteria which has been described in its physical details by
Charcot, and to which alone the term should strictly be applied. Even
though hysteria as a disease may be described as one and indivisible,
there are yet to be found, among the ordinary and fairly healthy
population, vague and diffused hysteroid symptoms which are dissipated in
a healthy environment, or pass nearly unnoted, only to develop in a small
proportion of cases, under the influence of a more pronounced heredity, or
a severe physical or psychic lesion, into that definite morbid state which
is properly called hysteria.
This diffused hysteroid condition may be illustrated by the results of a
psychological investigation carried on in America by Miss Gertrude Stein
among the ordinary male and female students of Harvard University and
Radcliffe College. The object of the investigation was to study, with the
aid of a planchette, the varying liability to automatic movements among
normal individuals. Nearly one hundred students were submitted to
experiment. It was found that automatic responses could be obtained in two
sittings from all but a small proportion of the students of both sexes,
but that there were two types of individual who showed a special aptitude.
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