'Does the woman knit the stocking, or is she knitted by it?' Groddeck asked, as well may the student of culture and personality. For while no one would deny that the interaction between culrural and personality factors is reciprocal, the understanding of the specific way in which events in the social system influence and are influenced by psychological events so far eludes us. Doubtless one of the reasons for this is our failure to find a suitable 'middle' language through which to co-ordinate the constructs of social structure with those of personality theory. Kardiner's 'basic personality type' promised much at first, but while useful in summarizing personality constants, it was of little use when it came to explaining why certain 'projective systems' are collectively reinforced to operate at the different level of institutions.

An inherent difficulty in assessing the relation between the two sets of events arises from the