An analysis of the appropriate unit for use in the measurement of level of galvanic skin resistance.

Abstract

The palmar skin resistance levels of 78 students were detd. in an effort to discover which of several possible units for specifying general levels of resistance might be appropriate. The units investigated were: resistance as such, conductance, leg resistance, square root of resistance, and square root of conductance. The principal criterion of acceptability of a unit was the requirement that the distribution of measures in terms of the unit should not violate the assumption of normality in the parent population (thus ensuring the amenability of results so specified to the usual types of statistic treatment). The results obtained indicate that conductance is the most satisfactory unit of measurement for specification of general levels of skin resistance.