§ 1. GENERAL SURVEY OF PATHOLOGICAL MATERIAL.
The pathological material which forms the basis of the present part of our study consists mainly of two hundred and forty-seven test records obtained for the most part from patients at the Kings Park State Hospital.
The different groups from which the cases were selected, together with the number from each group, are shown in Table I.
TABLE I.
Dementia præcox 108 cases.
Paranoic conditions 33 "
Epilepsy 24 "
General Paresis 32 "
Manic-depressive insanity 32 "
Involuntary melancholia 8 "
Alcoholic psychoses 6 "
Senile dementia 4 "
A comparison of our pathological with our normal material en masse reveals in the former evidence of a weakening of the normal tendency to respond by common reactions. This is shown in Table II.
TABLE II.
Common Doubtful Individual
reactions. reactions. reactions.
1,000 normal subject 91.7% 1.5% 6.8%
247 insane subjects 70.7% 2.5% 26.8%
It seems evident from this that pathological significance attaches mainly to individual reactions, so that our study resolves itself largely into (1) an analysis and classification of individual reactions and (2) an attempt to determine what relationship, if any, exists between the different types of reactions and the different clinical forms of mental disease.