CPS Unit Number 115-07

CPS Unit Number 115-07

Camp: 115

Unit ID: 7

Title: Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory, Harvard University

Operating agency: OSRD

Opened: 10 1943

Closed: 10 1946

Summary:

CPS Unit No. 115, subunit 7, located in the Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, subjected CPS men to experiments studying malaria.

 

The Department of Chemistry at Harvard University sponsored part one of this project that conducted experiments related to malaria.  Dr. Paul D. Bartlett directed the study that worked with one volunteer, Curtis Kyle Packer.

 

The Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory at Harvard sponsored part two of the study, directed by Dr. S.S. Stevens in 1943-1945 and Edwin B. Newman in 1946.  In this OSRD contract in effect from November 1943 through February 1946, up to thirteen men were subjected to extremely adverse conditions simulating communication while under high noise levels encountered in aircraft.  The experiment studied fourteen different types of electric hearing aids, the measurement of the transmissibility of words, and volume by electrical regulation.  The American Friends Service Committee served as oversight agency for both parts of this experiment.

 

In an additional phase of part two (?), W. H. Forbes and Dr. Cecil K. Drinker, directed psycho-acoustic work sponsored by the Cruft Laboratory at Harvard, working with forty-eight men from CPS Camp No. 32 at West Campton, New Hampshire.  That work concluded in September 1943.

Location:
Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States