There is a five-foot cord on this station, to the plug with which the participant connects into the distribution cable. The participant finds it easy to hold his station under the table, in his pocket, under his arm, or otherwise out of sight so that he can push the buttons anonymously. All of the stations connect, through the distribution cabling, to a box that sits in sight of all and displays four meters and a light bulb. Whenever any one participant pushed both of his buttons simultaneously, regardless of the distribution of button pushing at that time, the light on the display box goes on, accompanied by a nicely audible relay click.
Someone states a clear issue, and calls for a vote.
Instantaneous, anonymous tally available from meters. The two features of speed and anonymity make practical the presentation to the group of a program of questions to which rapid and honest answers can be expected. For the case where a participant is unhappy about affairs, but is inhibited from speaking out because it is hard to get a word in, because it seems that no one else is disturbed, because a dominating participant has him cowed, etc., we have developed the following procedure. The unhappy participant assumedly finds that the nth item states his feeling, so he blinks the light n times. Participants can express general positive or negative reactions to the course of events in a spontaneous fashion.