You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
This author has previously published an 'Analysis of Psycho-analysis' setting forth his reasons for rejecting psycho-analysis. In the present volume he gives what he considers a new approach to the problem of abnormal behaviour. The theory he adopts is bio-mechanistic. It is based on the assumption that our thoughts, feelings and actions are results of the functioning of a structure or mechanism which developed in the cause of evolution; and that abnormal forms of thought, feeling and action occur because of the limitations and defects of this mechanism. He regards states of consciousness as by-products of the physiological processes and he rejects the concept of the unconscious. He stresses three factors as determining the form of behaviour called forth in response to a stimulus: (1) The structural pattern of the nervous system. (2) The law of confluence, the tendency for streams of energy to flow together and find outlet by a common path. (3) The tension mechanism. The latter he subdivides into four: (a) pain mechanism; (b) pleasure mechanism; (c) anger mechanism; (d) laughter mechanism, which is a safety valve for the discharge of nervous energy. He rejects subconscious drives and stresses 'that it is thought which makes behaviour purposive in those cases in which it is purposive'. According to the author mental ills are due on the one hand to the situations of life which make demands upon the organism that it is unfitted to meet, and on the other to bad heredity, faulty education and somatic disease which bring about limitations and defects in the organism.
The author writes in a clear style and describes in a simplified way both normal and abnormal behaviour. The reviewer, however, fails to see in the book the promised new approach to the problem of mental behaviour.