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in those instances. But whether cases of this nature be regarded as impulsive insanity, or moral imbecility, it behoves the medical witness to form definite ideas concerning any particular case before he goes into the witness-box, or a similar fate may befall him as that which was experienced by a medical man, unversed in mental conditions, who expressed the opinion that a very deliberate and premeditated murder was due to an uncontrollable impulse. He was asked by the learned judge how he would in that particular case distinguish between an uncontrollable impulse, and an impulse which the prisoner did not wish to control, and was unable to supply the answer.

I may perhaps here refer to those most difficult cases to deal with, the young prostitute. Much controversy arises about this class of offender. Some people, as is known, hold that the offence in itself is an indication of mental defect, but prostitution was recognised as a profession many centuries before Christ, and I believe I am right in stating that of the numerous references to harlots in the Bible none mention anything which could be construed as indicative of mental disorder or defect in these women. The histories of other countries also contain the names of women of intelligence who have been prostitutes, and probably very many medical men in the course of their practice come across women of this class of decided intelligence. A consideration of the after career of some of these seem to indicate that their sex delinquencies were due to adolescent instability; some are due to nympho-mania, early insanity, drug habit, but the majority to indolence and vanity; others to overdevelopment of physical and sex characteristics, abnormal, perhaps not very uncommon, but not defective or insane. A few are, I believe, undoubtedly moral imbeciles, and others feeble-minded. But there is in my opinion reason to suppose that people of both sexes who have up to a certain period led sexually moral lives may, when once they have gratified by legitimate or other means the full sex instinct, experience for a considerable time such difficulty in dealing with their newlyaroused sensations and emotions, that they fail to control themselves; and I believe I have seen examples of this in both sexes, and that some lives of immorality and prostitution so arise. When any case comes up for consideration some help in determining whether any mental disorder or defect is present, or not, can be obtained, if the origin and circumstances of the first sex delinquency can be ascertained. The frequency of the immorality should also be considered, as an occasional lapse in a woman does not seem very different from a similar lapse in a man, and when it occurs in that sex it is not usually considered due to mental

disorder or defect. The most helpful fact in forming an opinion as to whether certifiable defect or not exists, apart from marked co-existing evidence of feeble-mindedness or moral imbecility, may be the age at which the delinquency commences.

Each case, of course, requires individual consideration, but it does seem advisable that these points, with others, should be considered before arriving at an opinion whether defect is present or not.

In bringing these somewhat disjointed remarks to a conclusion, I should add that I have made no attempt to bring to notice any original work in this important field. My main concern has been to express some views I have formed in the light of my own experience. But interesting enquiries are being conducted at the Borstal Institution, by Dr Methven, regarding the prognosis as to the future success of those youthful offenders under his care in relation to their mental ages; by Dr Grierson of Holloway Prison in connection with prostitution and mental ages, and by my colleague Dr Rixon concerning the mental age of the ordinary remand prisoner.

DELINQUENCY AND MENTAL DEFECT (II)1.

BY CYRIL BURT.

DR EAST's suggestive paper raises many problems of great interest and importance to the educational psychologist. My own tentative views upon them are derived from an experience limited almost exclusively to juvenile cases. The chief issues, likely to be discussed at this meeting, turn, mainly (I think) and at bottom, upon the definition of the phrase 'mental deficiency.' What do we mean by the term 'mental'? And how deficient must a person's mind be before he can be considered technically 'defective'?

'Mental' is the adjective of 'mind'; and to the psychologist 'mind' includes not only intelligence, but also temperament and character. Therefore, so far as psychological usage is concerned, mental deficiency is applicable, not only to defect in intelligence, but also to defect in temperament and character, if such can be shown to exist. It would appear, indeed, that those who framed, and those who administer the Mental Deficiency Acts, have had chiefly in view defect in intelligence; but the addition of moral imbecility to the other three categories seems to imply that temperament or character is also included within the scope of the Act.

I.

I may deal first, and most briefly, with defect in general intelligence, mental deficiency in the narrower and more familiar sense.

Here a further difficulty arises. The definitions inserted in the various Acts give a different significance to the term 'deficiency' as used of children and of adults. With children a mental ratio of 70 per cent. is the generally accepted borderline for defect in intelligence, although it cannot be too often repeated that a mere quantitative limit of this nature provides only a rough guiding principle, and is by no means the sole criterion upon which diagnosis must be based. Children whose intelligence falls below this level appear to be "permanently incapable of receiving proper benefit from the instruction in ordinary schools" at any rate as organised at present. Were adequate provision made for the 'merely

1 A contribution to the Symposium presented at the Joint Meeting of the Educational Section and the Medical Section of the British Psychological Society, April 25th, 1923.

dull and backward,' were special classes established for these intermediate grades in accessible elementary schools, it is possible that the upper limit for special school cases might be placed a little lower. Certainly, when the child's condition is reviewed towards the age of leaving school a lower criterion is accepted. Adults seldom "need care, supervision, and control for their own protection and for the protection of others" on the ground of mere defect of intelligence, unless their level is considerably below that which is accepted in the case of the school child.

#

The few figures I have to offer are based almost entirely upon enquiries among children under sixteen. Hence," when I use the term 'mentally defective,' I shall be including not only those who will be still recognised as defective even when adult, but also all who are, or should be, in a special M.D. school. Nevertheless, even with this higher limit and wider definition, I still feel very strongly that the importance of intellectual deficiency as a contributory factor in crime has been gravely exaggerated in the past. The percentages given by American investigators -particularly those using the Binet tests under the inspiration of Dr Goddard are far in excess of anything I have found in London. On making a review of all the juvenile delinquents that I have examined, I can discover only 7 per cent. who are mentally deficient in the sense I have defined; and in barely one-third of these cases could the defect be regarded as the main contributing factor. Among younger delinquents mental deficiency seems to be more common among boys than among girls. At and after puberty, however, more girls than boys are simultaneously defective and delinquent. If it be remembered that the borderline I am using is appreciably higher than that which would be adopted in the case of adults, it will be seen that my percentage agrees far more closely with Dr East's figure of 5 per cent. than with the earlier American figures which fluctuated broadly about an average of 50.

Upon the intellectual side, it is dulness or backwardness, rather than actual deficiency, that characterises the criminal child. Over 30 per cent. of my cases are 'dull,' and over 40 per cent. 'backward' educationally. And it is my firm belief that the institution of special classes for the backward child would rapidly be followed, and would largely pay for itself, by immense diminution in crime.

II.

I turn now to the more difficult problems of deficiency in temperament or character. Here I am entirely in harmony with Dr East's view that “in moral imbecility (so-called) there need be no intelligence defect." Med. Psych. III.

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So that, theoretically at least, the two conditions may be discussed as separate and distinct species of the same wider genus.

Medical and legal text-books, where they touch upon the matter, seem still to assume the existence of an innate moral sense; and the moral defective is apparently regarded as one who is innately defective in this innate moral capacity. The doctrine is a popular legacy of what was at one time a leading school of English philosophy-the Cambridge Platonists; but nowadays, I doubt whether even the most retrograde philosopher would dream of reviving it as serious scientific doctrine. "Should one," says Shaftesbury (its best-known exponent); “who had the countenance of a gentleman, ask me, 'Why I would avoid being nasty, when nobody was present?' I should...answer, "Twas because I had a nose.' And...' What if I had a cold?' I might answer 'That I cared not to see myself nasty.' But what if it were dark? Why, even then, though I had neither nose nor eyes, my sense of the matter would still be the same." And so he postulates what he calls the moral sense, an inborn intuition perfectly on a par with the other inborn faculties—the sense of smell, of vision, and of taste. Thus, according to these moralists, the criminal is 'nasty,' because he is born without an ethical nose.

Psychologists have long ago abandoned such a short and easy metaphor. Morality does not rest upon a simple intuition; but is a highly complex quality acquired after birth by slow and painful processes. It consists of memories, sentiments, and habits, associated ways of thinking, feeling, and acting, which are not inherited or inborn, but are built up afresh, by experience and training, during each individual's lifetime. The foundations of character, it is true, rest upon certain innate tendencies; but character itself is not innate.

Now the term 'deficiency' as used in the Mental Deficiency Acts refers to a defect which is at once permanent and demonstrably existing from an early age. In most cases where the defect is intellectual, this means that the deficiency is inborn. I take it that the same construction should be put upon the term deficiency in considering temperament or character. If this be granted, it follows that there can be no such thing as a moral defective in the strict interpretation of the phrase, since strictly speaking a moral defect must be a defect of acquisition. It is noteworthy, too, that in the Mental Deficiency Act, the definition of the moral imbecile turns, first of all, not on the mere absence of a moral disposition, nor yet on the mere presence of immoral impulses-of 'strong vicious or criminal propensities on which punishment has little or no deterrent effect"-but primarily upon the existence from an early

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