It may soon be possible to reliably compare some features, such as the average and the dispersion, of the charged-particle multiplicity distributions from e +e -annihilation with those measured in p p annihilation and in pp interactions. To facilitate this comparison, we present some marked differences in these quantities for j7p annihilation in the range 6 . ; 3.8 to 8 GeV when compared to p p interactions at the same available energy.We make a preliminary comparison of the average charged multiplicity from e +eand p p annihilations.Recently, there have been s p e~u l a t i o n s~~% o ncerning apparent similarities between the average multiplicity of charged particles emerging f r o m the e'eannihilation p r o c e s s a t center-of-mass total energy G, and f r o m pp interactions a t the saine available energy (i.e., v'?=tT+2ril,).As is well known, it is very difficult to obtain reliable indications concerning dynamics simply froin the average inultiplicity and its slow growth wilh energy. Much inore interesting would be similarities o r differences in the distributions of partial c r o s s sections f o r ?z charged prongs. These do not yet exist r eliably for e+em annihilation because of the difficuities in correcting the present raw data for these quantities ."owever, s o m e information of this kind can be obtained from data on the pp annihilation process in the s a m e range of fi a s i s under study a t SLAC. In particular, the width of the scaled multiplicity distribution, a s measured by D/(?z,), where D = ((zc2) -(nc)2)"2, can be reliably extracted. In this note, we give the results for this quantity from data a t five energies from 6 = 3 . 8 to about 8 GeV, which cover well the region for which e'eannihilation data is presently under analysis a t SLAC.' These indicate that there a r e considerable differences between the multiplicity distributions f r o m Fp annihilation and those f r o m pp interac-tions, when compared a t the same available energy. This is a l s o true f o r the average chargedparticle multlplicities, when account i s taken of the different charges of the initial states. We emphas i z e that it i s to these differences that the forthcoming information on multiplicity distributions from e'e' annihilation should be compared, in o rd e r to obtain information about possible dynamical similarities between the lepton-induced and the hadron-induced annihilation processes. We point out that the presently available average charged ~nultiplicities from e'eannihilation lie systematically below those from $p annihilation by a s much a s one unit. At each energy we construct a multiplicity distribution by subtracting the pp partial inelastic c r o s s sections from the corresponding 3p c r o s s sections, which involve both production and annihilation. By using this method we neglect the 0prong annihilation channels which, in any case, a r e expected to give a s m a l l contribution to the annihilation c r o s s section (see f o r instance Ref. 4). We have checked this procedure a t 5.7 GeV/c and...
